Improving Access to Detection and Treatment of Breast Cancer

Early detection and treatment of breast cancer is critical to saving women’s lives, and yet only one-third of all women over age 50 actually receive an annual mammogram.  In 1990, Congress created the Breast and Cervical Cancer Mortality Prevention Act (S 2283) to allow the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to administer breast and cervical cancer screening for low income, uninsured, and underinsured women. The National Breast and Cervical Cancer Early Detection Program (NBCCEDP) was thus born. NBCCEDP provides free breast and cervical cancer screening and follow-up diagnostic services to women in need. As of summer 2004, the CDC, in partnership with state and local health agencies and other community organizations, provided over 1.75 million mammograms which detected 14,446 cases of breast cancer.

Unfortunately, nearly 2,500 women under the age of 65 who have been diagnosed with breast cancer through the CDC nationwide screening program lack the insurance needed to cover treatment costs. As a result, health agencies and advocates have scrambled to help find treatment through charity care and donated services. In 1998, I cosponsored landmark legislation that Congress passed into law last year to provide low-income women with the treatment they desperately need. The Breast and Cervical Cancer Prevention and Treatment Act of 2000 (S 662) gives states the option of providing medical assistance through Medicaid to eligible women who are screened for and found to have breast or cervical cancer through the CDC's NBCCEDP.  On October 24th, 2000 President Clinton signed this bill into law and as of January 10, 2003, the Secretary of Health and Human Services has approved a total of 48 states' and the District of Columbia's proposals to expand Medicaid benefits to uninsured women who are diagnosed with breast or cervical cancer through a federal screening program.