Among other things, the project requests substantial federal funding – around $1 billion – to enable the National Institutes of Health and other government agencies to spearhead new research, cancer treatments and detection methods.
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Some of that money has already been appropriated in the federal spending bill that President Barack Obama signed in December, the officials told reporters on a conference call. Although Obama has scaled back his legislative ambitions from the sweeping proposals he pushed earlier in his presidency, he still needs Congress to help finish what he’s started in certain areas – trade being chief among them. His son Beau Biden died from brain cancer previous year, and the vice president said that his goal is to get the public and private sectors together to work collaboratively.
We have collectively been involved in the world of “onco-politics” for the equivalent of six decades, and share both similar and diverse perspectives of what has transpired since the 1980s in cancer research, treatment, prevention, and advocacy in the aftermath of President Nixon’s “War on Cancer” declared in 1971. More details on that fund will be released in coming weeks.
And that accomplishment will most likely require a global effort and not one that makes America alone “the country that cures cancer once and for all”.
“During his final State of the Union, the President put me in charge of a new national commitment to ending cancer as we know it”, Biden said Monday. Top officials from the Department of Health and Human Services, Defense Department, VA, NIH, and FDA are expected to be in attendance. The Food and Drug Administration, the Pentagon and the Department of Veterans Affairs will receive smaller amounts of money focused on data research and broader cancer studies.
The task force will be funded by the NIH.
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Obama and Biden are slated to meet with cabinet members and health officials at the White House on Monday to discuss the path forward. Annual research funding of more than $72 million supports the UNM CCC’s 132 cancer scientists.
