A flurry of action in Congress last week moved emergency funding to combat the Zika virus a step closer to passage. At-risk states, such as Hawaii, are within arm’s reach of critically needed help.

The timing is late. Already, the mosquito season has kicked in for even the coldest parts of the country. Still, there’s a chance to make a difference for the most vulnerable states, where the temperatures and the populations of the Zika-carrying mosquitoes likely will soar over the new few months.

But a big obstacle remains: Will House Speaker Paul Ryan and his GOP majority continue to draw pointless lines in the sand, or will they engage in the sort of bipartisan compromise that once allowed actual governing to happen in our nation’s capital?

Last Wednesday, the House passed a $622 million Zika appropriation on a straight party-line vote. The funding fell well short of the $1.9 billion in emergency monies requested months ago by President Obama. The White House quickly said the president likely would veto the “woefully inadequate” measure if it passed the Senate.

The following day, the Senate passed its own $1.1 billion funding package for Zika mitigation on a bipartisan, 68-29 vote. Unlike the House measure, which is only good through September — though Ryan says more money could be appropriated after that — the Senate bill provides funding through September 2017. Though the Senate bill too falls far short, it get much closer than the House version to what the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says we need to cover prevention measures for some 200 million people in the at-risk zones.

President Obama’s administration already has transferred about $600 million to the Zika fight from unspent funding on Ebola virus prevention. He offered a blunt reaction to both bills on Friday, after getting an update on the virus’ spread from federal health officials.

“Congress needs to get me a bill. It needs to get me a bill that has sufficient funds to do the job,” he said. “To the extent that we’re not handling this thing on the front end, we’re going to have bigger problems on the back end.”

Already, 279 pregnant women in the United States and its territories have been diagnosed with Zika. The virus was proven earlier this year to cause severe brain and cranial abnormalities in babies born to infected women. Photos of scores of infants with microcephaly in Brazil, where the outbreak originated, have captured the world’s attention in recent months, and show the urgent need to prevent similarly widespread infections in the United States, even as the virus spreads quickly across Latin America and Africa.

Not Up To Governing?

The White House’s request represents what leaders of the CDC, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and other scientific experts have described as the minimum needed to put meaningful mitigation measures in place in the U.S.

The gulf between its proposal and the House version is galling to public health officials and irritating even to some leaders within the Republican Party. Sen. Marco Rubio, whose home state of Florida is one of those most at risk, was among those who harshly criticized the House funding package late last week.

The bipartisan nature of the Senate’s approach is enough better that the White House has grudgingly signaled it might be able to support that measure. But even at nearly twice the spending level of the House bill, it leaves far too much undone.

What senators took out of their bill to arrive at a total both sides could support is frankly shocking: For a start, $350 million in funding for the embattled U.S. territory of Puerto Rico, where Zika is already well established and which is on the verge of financial collapse under a crippling, $72 billion debt.

In the midst of this fecklessness lies an uncertain fate for Hawaii, which experienced a dengue fever outbreak just last fall carried by the same mosquitoes that can carry Zika.

Some compromise.

Still, it would at least put some broad prevention measures in motion, such as getting more vector-control workers into the field around the country, putting additional entomologists in the labs, quickening the pace on development of a Zika vaccine and other critical steps for which time is of the essence.

But with $500 million separating the House and Senate measures, House conservatives are digging in their heels as the Memorial Day recess looms.  There seems little hope that the gulf between the two measures can be resolved before June, when summer vacations and inviting weather will begin to lure families outdoors all around the country — a point not lost on the president.

“They should not be going off on recess before this is done,” he said Friday.

Over the past several years, Congress has shown time and again that it simply is not up to the challenge of governing. Whether pointlessly threatening or causing government shutdowns, holding dozens of unsuccessful votes to repeal Obamacare or failing to act on immigration reform, gun control and many more major issues, the GOP majority under first Speaker John Boehner and now Ryan continues to fail even its most basic responsibilities.

By comparison, even Sen. Mitch McConnell’s politicized leadership of the Senate looks better — though the Kentucky Republican still won’t schedule hearings on the Supreme Court nominee President Obama put forward three months ago, even though 64 percent or more of voters in five key swing states say Merrick Garland should be confirmed.

Zika offers yet another opportunity for Republicans to step up and and do their jobs. U.S. Sen. Brian Schatz summed up the situation more honestly than anyone else we heard from this week.

“This is the most basic test of governing. This isn’t a matter of political philosophy, this is a matter of competence,” said the Hawaii senator, who has been a vocal advocate for passage of the president’s request. Republicans “have got to show that they can be trusted with the keys to the car, and right now it’s not clear.”

This fecklessness leaves an uncertain fate for Hawaii, which experienced a dengue fever outbreak just last fall carried by the same mosquitoes that can carry Zika. Dengue was diagnosed in more than 260 individuals, causing a state emergency and stretching existing public-health resources to the limit. The state stepped up with considerable new funding for Zika and dengue mitigation in the recent legislative session, but we still need additional federal help.

We are well past the time for a prudent legislative branch to act. As we first said five weeks ago, Congress owes its constituents a response now, not whenever House and Senate GOP leaders feel they can score more points with a party base for whom working with the president is anathema.

If the House and Senate fail to act before lawmakers return to their districts (as they’re scheduled to do this weekend), then they will bear a damning responsibility for every child in the U.S. born with Zika whose exposure might have been prevented.