NEW ORLEANS — President Joe Biden is specializing in the policy goals he cares about most now that he is not any longer looking for a second term: He will visit New Orleans on Tuesday to advertise his administration's “Moonshot” initiative, which goals to dramatically reduce cancer deaths.
The President and First Lady Jill Biden toured medical facilities at Tulane University that receive federal funding to research cancer treatments. Using a bit of raw meat, researchers demonstrated how they’re working to enhance scanning technology to quickly distinguish between healthy and cancerous cells during surgery.
The Bidens then supported the announcement of $150 million in funding from the Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health to support eight research teams across the country working to assist surgeons more successfully remove tumors from cancer patients. This brings the entire amount the agency is providing to develop breakthrough cancer treatments to $400 million.
Cancer surgery “demands the best surgeons and puts a strain on families,” Biden said. He said the cutting-edge technology demonstration he witnessed would give doctors a solution to visualize tumors in real time, reducing the necessity for follow-up surgeries.
“We are acting quickly because we know that all families affected by cancer are in a race against time,” Biden said.
The honored teams include teams from Tulane, Dartmouth College, Johns Hopkins University, Rice University, the University of California, San Francisco, the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, the University of Washington and Cision Vision in Mountain View, California.
Before he leaves office in January, Biden hopes to maneuver the United States closer to his 2022 goal of reducing cancer deaths within the United States by 50 percent over the subsequent 25 years and improving the lives of caregivers and cancer patients.
“I'm a born optimist about what Americans can do,” Biden said. “We're doing so much. That's important.”
According to experts, the goal could be achieved with the suitable investments.
“We are curing people of diseases that we previously thought were absolutely incurable and unsurvivable,” said Karen Knudsen, CEO of the American Cancer Society and the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network.
Cancer is the second leading explanation for death within the United States after heart disease. This 12 months alone, the American Cancer Society estimates that 2 million recent cases might be diagnosed and 611,720 people will die from cancer.
Nevertheless, “if all innovation stopped today and we could only give people access to the innovations we know today, we believe we could reduce cancer mortality by another 20 to 30 percent,” Knudsen said.
For Biden, the difficulty is so personal that in his recent Oval Office speech marking his exit from the 2024 election campaign, he promised to proceed fighting for “my cancer moon flight” so “we can defeat cancer as we know it.”
“Because we can do it,” Biden said on the time.
In his speech, he said that this initiative can be a priority in his final months in office. He would also work to strengthen the economy, defend abortion rights, protect children from gun violence and make changes to the Supreme Court, which he described as “extreme” in its current configuration at a recent event.
Both the President and First Lady have had skin lesions removed prior to now that were found to be basal cell carcinoma, a typical and simply treatable type of cancer. In 2015, their eldest son Beau died of an aggressive brain tumor at age 46.
“It's not just a personal issue,” Biden said Tuesday. “It's about what's possible.”
Since the president dropped out of the race and supported Vice President Kamala Harris, the general public calendar has turn out to be much quieter, which is why Tuesday's trip is a special highlight.
Supporters praised Biden for specializing in cancer, bringing together stakeholders and securing commitments from private firms, nonprofits and patient groups.
They say the additional attention the federal government has paid to the difficulty has put the country heading in the right direction to chop cancer mortality rates by no less than half and forestall greater than 4 million deaths from the disease by 2047. This has been achieved by improving access to cancer treatments and reminding people of the importance of screening, which suffered a setback throughout the coronavirus pandemic.
“President Biden’s passion and commitment to this cause have made a tremendous difference for the entire cancer community, including those living with cancer,” said Jon Retzlaff, chief policy officer on the American Association for Cancer Research.
Looking to the long run, Retzlaff said, “The most important thing for us is solid, sustainable and predictable annual funding for the National Institutes of Health. And if we can achieve that through the NIH and the National Cancer Institute, the programs created as part of the Cancer Moon flight can continue.”
Biden's initiatives include changes to make screenings and cancer treatments more accessible to more people, said Knudsen of the American Cancer Society.
“You've already paid for cancer research. You've already paid for the innovation. Now we're bringing it to the people,” Knudsen said.
She also said she would welcome a move by the subsequent government to ban menthol cigarettes, which she said could save 654,000 lives over the subsequent 40 years.
Scientists now know that cancer isn’t a single disease, but tons of of diseases that respond otherwise to different treatments. Some cancers have biomarkers that could be targeted with existing drugs to slow tumor growth. Many more targets are still waiting to be discovered.
“We hope that the next administration, whoever it will be, will continue to keep the focus and emphasis on our national commitment to eradicate cancer as we know it,” said Dr. Crystal Denlinger, CEO of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network, a bunch of elite cancer centers.
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