Springfield Resident Joins Nearly 100 Volunteers From Across Country for ‘One Voice Against Cancer’ Lobby Day
JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. – May 9, 2016 — Local American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network (ACS CAN) volunteer Jerry Neville will join nearly 100 other cancer patients, survivors, caregivers, physicians and researchers representing 50 cancer organizations in Washington, D.C., this week to urge lawmakers to make fighting cancer a top national priority.
These advocates are uniting as part of the 17th annual One Voice Against Cancer (OVAC) lobby day to ask their legislators to fund cancer research at the National Cancer Institute (NCI) and National Institutes of Health (NIH).
“As a cancer survivor, I’ve witnessed firsthand the benefits of past investment in cancer research,” Neville said. “For decades, research supported by the NIH and NCI has played a key role in virtually every major cancer prevention, detection and treatment discovery. Even with the recent funding increase these organizations received, overall funding for cancer research is still well below where it was a decade ago. Congress can do more to turn this around.”
Together, Neville and other OVAC volunteers will urge Congress to support the goals of the National Cancer Moonshot initiative in order to capitalize on promising new research and maintain momentum in ongoing discoveries. Specifically, they will ask Congress to:
OVAC volunteers will also request that the Senate take up an Innovation for Healthier Americans Initiative legislative package that includes funding for the NIH and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
Neville – a three-time non-Hodgkin lymphoma survivor – credits his survivorship with the strides that have been made in cancer research over the past 20 years.
“We are all one degree from cancer. Everyone knows someone – whether it’s a friend, family or we’ve been diagnosed personally,” Neville said. “Nearly 1.7 million people will be newly diagnosed with the cancer this year, and all of them will be relying on research to treat it. I urge Congress to increase funding for cancer research and provide hope to the millions facing this disease now or in the future.”
This year in Missouri, it is estimated that 34,270 people will be diagnosed with cancer and 12,970 will die from the disease. Federal funding for medical research and cancer prevention programs has had a role in every major advance against this disease. View a full list of the OVAC health-care groups joining ACS CAN in this year’s lobby day.
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After months of delay and hard negotiations, Congress has finally passed a funding bill! The bill includes a small increase for cancer research and prevention programs.