I would like to submit the following as a letter to the editor:

With all the noise over presidential politics readers may have missed some very important action on Capitol Hill last week. That’s when Rep. Tom Cole and 343 other Democrats and Republicans cast their votes in support of more medical research funding. The overwhelming bipartisan passage of the 21st Century CURES bill will move the nation closer to restoring its dwindling investment in medical research—research that could save lives.

Over the last decade funding for the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has dropped more than 20 percent when adjusted for inflation. Maybe that doesn’t sound like a lot to you, but it’s a lot when it comes to the kind of and the number of grants the NIH can give to research institutions. It’s meant critical research has gone undone, scientists have left the labs and potential treatments and cures have been left in test tubes. It’s also meant the U.S. has come dangerously close to losing its medical research preeminence to countries like Germany and China.

This bill—which would boost NIH funding by $1.75 billion annually for five years— would be a significant step toward regaining our nation’s research status, the associated economic benefit of such research and, most importantly, the new treatments that would come from more adequate funding.

Thank you Rep. Cole for taking action and voting in favor of something so important to our nation’s long-term economic and physical well-being.

Brittney Hodges

Midwest City, OK

Volunteer, American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network