Public Policy and Strategy
NCRA’s Executive Director; Lori Swain, MS
Update
In April NCRA hosted two advocacy activities: Our traditional Walk on the Hill and the new Advocacy Now Letter writing campaign. Both campaigns focused on NCRA’s funding and policy priorities which included:
- For Fiscal Year 2023, funding the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Cancer Programs at $472 million, which includes $76 million for the National Program of Cancer Registries (NPCR) to fully implement the cloud registry program.
- Supporting the forthcoming Counting Veterans Cancer Act.
- For Fiscal Year 2023, funding the National Cancer Institute (NCI) at $7.766 billion.
For Walk on the Hill 44 of our 2022 NCRA Annual Conference attendees held 67 meetings which represented 19 states. These meetings were evenly split between the House and Senate. Immediately following this DC area event, NCRA opened up the opportunity for the full membership to get engaged through our April 18-29 Advocacy Now campaign. This was a first for NCRA where we developed an easy process for our members to send specific letters to their members of Congress. For this event 419 NCRA members participated which resulted in nearly 1200 letters sent to Congress in support of NCRA’s funding and policy priorities!
In the coming weeks we expect to see the Counting Veterans Cancer Act introduced in the Senate. At that time, we will again be engaging our members to help us with this final, and most important, step to assure that this legislation moves successfully through Congress; all the way to the White House for President Biden’s signature into law!
As a reminder, here is some background on the forthcoming Counting Veterans Cancer Act: According to 2017 data from the CDC’s National Program of Cancer Registries (NPCR), approximately 26,500 cancer cases among veterans were not reported to state cancer registries funded through NPCR. Federal law requires CDC and NCI to collect cancer data for all newly diagnosed cancer cases, but that cannot be achieved due to frequent lack of reporting by the Department of Veterans’ Affairs medical facilities.
The Counting Veterans’ Cancer Act will require all data on veterans diagnosed with cancer to be reported by the Department of Veterans’ Affairs to central cancer registries.
The Counting Veterans’ Cancer Act will improve veteran care by:
- Identifying cancer-related disparities in the veteran’s community;
- Improving understanding of the cancer related needs of veterans;
- Increasing opportunities for veterans with cancer to be included in clinical trials, cancer-related research, and analysis.
Further, releasing all data from VA medical facilities to State cancer registries will provide more complete data for health care providers, public health officials, and researchers to:
- Measure cancer occurrence and trends at the local and national levels
- Inform and prioritize cancer education and screening programs
- Evaluate efficacy of prevention efforts and treatments
- Determine survival rates
- Conduct research on causes, diagnoses, and treatments
- Ensure quality and equity in cancer care
- Plan for health services
Bottom line - The Counting Veterans’ Cancer Act will help ensure all veterans receive the highest quality cancer care they need and deserve! Look for more information in your “inbox” soon to get involved.
