A $1 Billion Landmark In Fighting Breast Cancer: Leahy And Allies Win Key Step For Another $175 Million. . . action comes as Leahy is inducted into Breast Cancer Hall of Fame

May 25, 1999

The Senate Appropriations Committee Tuesday approved a proposal by Sen. Patrick Leahy and his allies for another installment of breast cancer research funds that would boost the eight-year total of their effort above $1 billion.

Leahy, Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) and others launched the project to tap Department of Defense (DOD) medical research for breast cancer work in 1992. The agency by then had become a major source of prostate cancer research funds. Harkin, Leahy and others -- backed by a nationwide grassroots campaign headed by breast cancer survivor Pat Barr of Bennington, Vt. -- have succeeded in also making DOD a major source of breast cancer funding. The Defense Subcommittee of the Senate Appropriations Committee Monday approved their request for $175 million for the federal fiscal year 2000 budget. If the number stays firm in the remaining steps in the legislative process, it will raise to $1.005 billion the total they have secured since 1992. The full Appropriations Committee approved the bill today, and it goes next to the Senate floor. Leahy, a senior member of the committee and of the defense subcommittee, said he expects efforts to reduce the earmark in the House.

“This has become a superb research program that by now also is one of the largest and most reliable sources of funding for the drive to eradicate this disease,” said Leahy. “It’s gratifying to know that in eight years we’ve come a billion research dollars closer to winning this war.”

The panel’s action comes on the same day that Leahy is being inducted by the National Breast Cancer Coalition (NBCC) as one of three charter members into NBCC’s new Public Policy Hall of Fame, in recognition of Leahy’s wide-ranging and persistent work to help find a cure for the disease. He has received the coalition’s Leadership Award every year since its inception in 1993. “I can’t think of a hall of fame I would be prouder to be inducted into,” he said. “It is a great honor, and I am dedicating it to Pat Barr, who convinced me eight years ago that it wasn’t such a crazy idea to make the Defense Department a leading source of breast cancer research dollars.”

The latest $175 million earmark for the Army Breast Cancer Research program features Innovative Developmental and Exploratory Awards (IDEA) grants which encourage and support risk-taking research and allow scientists to quickly respond to new discoveries. So far, more than 9,300 research proposals have been received, 4,300 of those were considered worthy of funding, and 1,712 have received funding.