The House of Representatives last week approved the 21st Century Cures Act and it received Senate approval. President Obama has promised to sign it, according to an article on the Health Line website. The legislation is 1,000 pages long.
“I don’t think anybody can wrap their head around an omnibus bill like this,” Dr. George Demetri, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and a member of the board of directors of the American Association for Cancer Research, told Healthline. “However, while there are plenty of supporters for the additional research funding the bill provides, there are critics who are opposed to the provisions that would allow the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to more quickly approve new drugs and treatments,” the article reads.
The Cures Act bill is worth $6.3 billion and about $4.8 billion of the bill will go to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) over the next 10 years.
“This money would go toward research on diseases such as Alzheimer’s, cancer, and traumatic brain injuries,” the article reads. “This is going to be a game-changer,” House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wisconsin) said at a news conference last week. “It will fundamentally transform the way that we treat and cure diseases in this country.”
A representative from Colorado told USA Today that the bill will potentially save countless lives in the future because it makes vital innovations in biomedical research within reach for scientists and researchers.
About $1.8 billion will go towards cancer research and $1 billion will be put towards combatting the opioid addiction crisis. It’s estimated that about 14,000 people die in the United States every year from overdoses involving prescription drugs.
“This part of the bill will also establish a mental health and substance abuse ‘policy laboratory’ for prevention and treatment of those ailments,” the article reads. “It will also require insurers to cover mental health the same way they cover other medical costs.”
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