Hudson Applauds Signing of Childhood Cancer STAR Act
June 6, 2018
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
June 6, 2018
Hudson Applauds Signing of Childhood Cancer STAR Act
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today U.S. Representative Richard Hudson (NC-08), co-Chair of the Pediatric Trauma Caucus and a leader on the Energy and Commerce’s Health Subcommittee, released the following statement after President Donald Trump signed the bipartisan Childhood Cancer Survivorship, Treatment, Access, and Research (STAR) Act (S. 292), the most significant pediatric cancer research bill in Congress’ history:
“America’s children are our future, and this is another important step to help deliver hope and cures to young patients and their families.”
The Energy and Commerce Committee and the Subcommittee on Health has a long history of advancing legislation aiming to better the lives of patients. Most notably, Energy and Commerce spearheaded the landmark 21st Century Cures Act, which accelerates the critical cycle of discovering, developing, and delivering new cures and treatments.
The Childhood Cancer STAR Act passed the House of Representatives on May 22, 2018, by voice vote, and the Senate on March 22, 2018, by unanimous consent. It will help advance both research and treatments for pediatric cancer. The bipartisan bill reauthorizes and modifies the National Childhood Cancer Registry and establishes programs for pediatric cancer survivors. It will support the collection of donated biospecimens from children, adolescents, and young adults with cancer along with demographic information, create pilot programs to develop and evaluate systems for monitoring and providing treatment for cancer survivors, and provide grants to states to improve childhood cancer registries.
Specifically, the bill will:
- Authorize $30 million a year through FY2023 for grants to support the National Childhood Cancer Registry.
- Authorize the National Cancer Institute (NCI) to make awards to support childhood cancer biorepositories available to health care professionals and scientific researchers.
- Authorize the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), to award grants to state cancer registries to enhance and expand infrastructure to track the epidemiology of cancer in children, adolescents, and young adults.
- Require at least one individual with experience in pediatric oncology to be included on the National Cancer Advisory Board.
- Require the Director of National Institutes of Health (NIH) to ensure that childhood cancer research projects conducted or supported by NIH are included in the appropriate reports to Congress, which may include reports regarding the Pediatric Research Initiative.
- Allow the Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS) to make grants establishing pilot programs to develop, study, or evaluate model systems to improve the quality and efficiency of care for childhood cancer survivors and to improve the coordination of care as survivors transition to adult care.
- Require the Secretary to conduct a review and report to Congress on the Department’s activities related to workforce development for health care providers who treat pediatric cancer patients and survivors.
- Allow the NIH Director to make grants to entities to conduct or support research relating to pediatric cancer survivors.
- Allow the Secretary to identify best practices for quality childhood cancer survivorship care in consultation with experts in late effects of disease and treatment of childhood cancers.
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Issues:Health Care