2025 Delaware Legislative Priorities

Victory in the fight against cancer requires bold new public policies that promote cancer prevention, early detection of cancer, and expand access to quality, affordable health care. Lawmakers make many decisions that impact the lives of Delawareans impacted by cancer and their leadership is vital to defeating this disease. In 2025 the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network (ACS CAN) will work with the Delaware General Assembly and the Meyer-Evans Gay Administration on legislative and regulatory efforts that provide affordable, adequate access to health insurance including Medicaid, ensure adequate funding for lifesaving cancer screening and prevention programs, and enact prevention policies to protect kids from tobacco products and help support those who are trying to quit. We will be making the following fact-based policies a priority and ask for your support:

Cancer Prevention and Early Detection

• Breast and Cervical Cancer: ACS CAN will advocate to maintain funding of $1.895 million for Delaware’s Screening for Life program, the program that offers free screening tests for breast, cervical, colon, lung, and prostate cancer.

Access to Care

• Access to Biomarker Testing: ACS CAN will advocate for improved coverage of comprehensive biomarker testing. Progress in improving cancer outcomes increasingly involves the use of precision medicine, which uses information about a person’s own genes or proteins to better diagnose and treat diseases like cancer. Biomarker testing is an important step to accessing precision medicine which includes targeted therapies that can lead to improved survivorship and better quality of life for cancer patients, but insurance coverage for biomarker testing is failing to keep pace with innovations and advancements in treatment.

Reducing the Toll of Tobacco

• Tobacco Taxes: Increasing tobacco taxes is one of the most effective ways to reduce tobacco use, especially among kids. ACS CAN opposes any reduction in taxes applied to tobacco products, including any reduction in the cigar tax.
• Tobacco Prevention and Cessation Funding: ACS CAN will work to maintain funding for fact-based, statewide tobacco prevention and cessation programs at $9.3 million.
• Access to Tobacco Cessation: ACS CAN will advocate for all insurance plans, including the state Medicaid program, to provide a comprehensive cessation benefit that covers individual, group, and telephone counseling and all FDA-approved tobacco cessation medications without cost-sharing or other barriers to accessing care.