OLYMPIA, Wash. -– American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network advocates call on Washington Gov. Bob Ferguson to refuse to allow the long-term health of Washington residents to become collateral damage to the state’s current budget crisis. The state’s cancer prevention programs are one of the reasons Washington cancer incidence numbers are slightly better than the national average and those numbers will surely shift if those programs are diminished significantly.
The Commercial Tobacco Prevention Program (CTPP) combats the nearly $85 million invested each year by Big Tobacco to lure in more customers, many as young as middle school. The Breast, Cervical, and Colon Screening Program (BCCP) makes sure as many of Ferguson’s constituents as possible have access to screening for three of the state’s most prevalent forms of cancer.
The following statement can be attributed to Audrey Miller Garcia, Government Relations Director for ACS CAN Washington:
“The potential for budget cuts to do serious damage to the health of Washington residents needs to be understood fully by the Governor and others making these decisions. Heart disease, colorectal, breast and cervical cancer are four of the biggest killers in Washington. Previous budget cuts already cut colorectal screening from the state program. Further eroding the methods used to control them cannot be the way forward. Tobacco use costs the state countless lives and billions of dollars each year. Significant cuts to tobacco prevention and cessation or the Breast, Cervical, and Colon Screening Program will damage Washington families well beyond their bank accounts. The cost will be the health of our children and lives of our loved ones. This is not political posturing. It’s based in data and is not a possibility but an inevitability.”