Cancer diagnostics company Biomoda, Inc. (OTCBB: BMOD) today urged the New Mexico congressional delegation to support the Lung Cancer Mortality Reduction Act of 2009, which calls for a comprehensive federal program to achieve a 50% reduction in the mortality rate of lung cancer by 2016.
In letters sent to Sen. Jeff Bingaman, Sen. Tom Udall, Rep. Martin Heinrich, Rep. Ben Ray Lujan, and Rep. Harry Teague, Biomoda President John Cousins said lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in the United States, taking more lives each year than the next four biggest cancers – colon, breast, prostate and pancreatic – combined.
“In spite of these statistics, lung cancer receives only a small fraction of federal research dollars devoted to cancer. The stigma of smoking continues to undermine research funding efforts even though over 60% of new cases are diagnosed in people who never smoked or who had already quit, many of them decades ago. Only 16% will be diagnosed at an early treatable stage, and most will die within a few months. The need for earlier detection and more effective treatments is urgent,” Cousins said.
S. 332 and its House counterpart, H.R. 2112, would authorize the Secretaries of Health and Human Services, Defense and Veterans Affairs to combine assets and develop a coordinated, mission-oriented lung cancer research program to be implemented over the next five years with funding contingent on the quality and scope of the plan of action.
“We see the devastating effects of lung cancer on New Mexicans every day. Biomoda is conducting clinical trials of an inexpensive, noninvasive diagnostic that currently is used as an investigational-use-only test for detection of early-stage lung cancer among New Mexico veterans. With generous support from the New Mexico State Legislature, we have enrolled more than 500 veterans in our study,” Cousins said. “Results from this trial and a larger clinical trial to begin next year will be submitted to the FDA for approval of the CyPath® diagnostic that we believe will significantly increase both the early diagnosis of cancer and patient survival rates.”
Cousins acknowledged the Lung Cancer Alliance and other advocacy groups for raising awareness about the importance of early detection to improve survivability and working to increase research funding for lung cancer at the federal and state levels.
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