On December 19, 2009, President Obama signed into law a Defense Department appropriations bill (H.R. 3326) that extends for two months the emergency unemployment insurance benefits program and includes a continuation of the 65 percent COBRA premium subsidy included in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA - P.L. 111-5). The law extends the length of the COBRA subsidy period to 15 months (currently nine months) and changes the period of eligibility for the subsidy to February 28, 2010, replacing the December 31, 2009 deadline. Additionally, the law also freezes Medicare physician payments for two months, avoiding a 21 percent reduction scheduled to have gone into effect January 1, 2010.  The House passed H.R. 3326 on December 16 and the Senate approved the legislation on December 19.

The full text of H.R. 3326 is available here.

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