Pointing to federal cybersecurity warnings and rising digital attacks on hospitals, U.S. Sen. Rick Scott is calling on Congress to ban Chinese-manufactured medical devices from any healthcare facility that receives federal funding.
In an op-ed published in RealClearPolitics, Scott warned that medical equipment made in China could allow foreign access to sensitive American health records and biometric data.
“Every day, Americans walk into hospitals trusting that the machines keeping watch over their hearts are working for them,” Scott wrote. “Most have no idea that some of those machines may be working for Communist China.”
The Florida senator highlighted a previous joint warning from the Food and Drug Administration and federal cybersecurity officials regarding the Contec CMS8000.
The device, widely used in American hospitals to track vital signs like blood pressure, heart rates, and electrocardiograms, is manufactured by a company based in China. Investigators discovered a software backdoor within the monitor designed to route patient data to external remote servers.
Scott noted that under Chinese law, domestic companies cannot refuse government requests for data.
The push comes amid mounting cybersecurity concerns across the healthcare sector. According to FBI data, healthcare facilities faced more cyberattacks in a single year than any other critical infrastructure sector in the United States.
Recent incidents have caused severe operational disruptions. A cyberattack on a hospital network comprising 140 facilities locked nurses out of digital records and nearly caused a critical medication error involving a newborn. In Ohio, a ransomware attack disrupted systems across 14 medical centers run by Kettering Health. In Alabama, a mother filed a lawsuit following her baby’s death, alleging the hospital failed to disclose an ongoing ransomware attack while she was in labor.
The U.S. Department of Commerce has launched a national security investigation into medical device imports under Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act.
Scott argued that federal action needs to go further. His proposed measures include barring Medicare and Medicaid dollars from hospitals that buy medical equipment from Chinese firms, establishing a phase-out timeline for existing gear, making foreign medical data espionage a federal crime, and enforcing stricter trade rules.
“American patients deserve better,” Scott wrote. “They deserve to have confidence that the medical machines watching over them in vulnerable moments belong to American doctors and hospitals, not Beijing.”
READ: Feds Seize Domains To Cripple Chinese Cyber Hacking Network Targeting U.S. Infrastructure
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