Senate Floor Speech
Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison
May 21, 2008

SENATOR HUTCHISON DISCUSSES CANCER RESEARCH


MRS. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, in about 20 minutes, I know we are going to turn pay tribute to Lyndon Baines Johnson. This is LBJ Day in the Capitol, and there are many speeches that will be made, there are many celebrations, there is a huge reunion of the LBJ family and his former staff people and supporters and Cabinet officers, and I am going to speak in that designated hour. But right now, in morning business, I would like to speak about another great Senator. I wish to speak about my colleague, Senator TED KENNEDY.

We all know we got a shock yesterday; that Senator Kennedy has been diagnosed with a cancerous brain tumor, and he has just been released from the hospital. We are all so grateful he has been able to go to the comfort of his own home with his family as they are deciding how the treatment will go forward. But I wish to take a moment to talk about something we have been working on together.

If I could think of one word for Senator TED KENNEDY, it would be ``fighter.'' He is a fighter for the causes in which he believes. In his 46 years as a Senator, he has fought on behalf of the American people, waging so many battles to advance the causes of justice, opportunity, and peace. Now, he is set to wage the greatest fight of his life, and in that fight he has the support and prayers of all his colleagues and all the American people.

Senator Kennedy's startling diagnosis comes the week after he and I announced our commitment to renew the war on cancer.

For the last several months, Senator Kennedy and I have been working on a bill to evaluate our progress on cancer research and treatment, address our shortcomings, and renew our commitment to eradicating this disease. There is no other person I would rather be working with on this initiative--now more than ever.

Senator Kennedy's diagnosis is such a poignant reminder that the battle has not been won. On May 8, the committee he chairs--the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee--held a hearing to discuss the Kennedy-Hutchison bill. Advocates and survivors of cancer such as Lance Armstrong and Elizabeth Edwards spoke about the need for progress and reform in all areas of cancer research and treatment. In the 37 years since the national declaration of the war on cancer, the age-adjusted mortality rate for cancer is still very high. When it is compared to the mortality rates of other chronic diseases, it is extraordinarily high. While there have been substantial achievements since the crusade began, we are far from winning this war. Let's look at the statistics.

Today, one out of two men and one out of three women will develop cancer in their lifetime. In my home State of Texas, approximately 96,000 people are expected to be diagnosed with cancer and 35,000 are expected to die of cancer in 2008 alone. The NIH, the National Institutes of Health, estimates the overall cost of cancer to our Nation in 2007 was $219 billion.

These grim statistics should not belie the wealth of knowledge we have gained over the years, but it is time for legislation to address the shortcomings in the structure of cancer research and treatment. Senator Kennedy and I are leading the effort to renew our war on cancer. We want to continue our search for cures, more effective treatments, and better preventive measures. The cancer community must embrace a coordinated assault against this disease. We must start looking at more cooperative efforts that focus on the big picture. The bill Senator Kennedy and I will introduce is targeted at the following: removing barriers currently hindering our progress in cancer research and treatment; improving access to early detection measures and cancer care; reducing disparities in cancer treatment; increasing enrollment in clinical trials--this is a very important part that I think is one of the keys we are missing; and encouraging additional opportunities for cancer research and more cooperative cancer research.

Our bill will encourage the movement of medications and treatment from the laboratory to the bedside more quickly. It is time we started sharing more information. There is great research being done at many of our institutions--some in my home State of Texas and some in his home State of Massachusetts are the very best; in Maryland at Johns Hopkins; in Minnesota. We have wonderful research institutions. But we are not sharing the information enough. We need to make sure this is a wholesale war and we are all in the same army, that we are marching in the same direction, and that we are coordinated in doing that.

As Senator Kennedy wages his own personal war on this dreaded disease, he will also be leading America's war on cancer with the Kennedy-Hutchison bill that we will introduce in the Senate. So many times Senator Kennedy has been the voice for the American people. He will truly be the voice for this bill to renew the war on cancer at this very difficult time in his life.

I know he is going to be standing on this floor, he is going to be negotiating this bill, he is going to be relentless in making sure it goes through with bipartisan support. We will work with the President--he will work with this President--because I have seen how he has worked with President Bush to further public education.

Senator Kennedy and I are going to renew the war on cancer with a new vigor and we are going to do it together, and he is going to pass this legislation. I know he will be by my side in his fight and in his fight for the American people. We are going to support him at this time in every possible way.


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