Dear Editor:
Several years ago a childhood friend told me he had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. We met in kindergarten and maintained that friendship for decades. His life ended too soon and he left behind a grieving family even after the best medical treatment available, treatment that often left him sick for weeks afterward.
Anyone who has experienced this disease knows the statistics are frightening. Too often, patients are diagnosed late and face limited treatment options. That’s why I was encouraged to see news coming out of the recent ASCO (American Society of Clinical Oncology) conference showing a new treatment that doubled survival for some patients with advanced pancreatic cancer.
For families facing a diagnosis today, that may sound like a statistic. For patients, it means more birthdays, more holidays, more time with children and grandchildren. It means hope.
Breakthroughs like this don’t happen overnight. They are the result of years of research, clinical trials, scientific investment, and the determination of researchers who refuse to give up on diseases that have taken too many lives.
As policymakers debate changes to our health care system, I hope they remember what is at stake. Patients need affordable access to medicines, but they also need future treatments that do not yet exist. There are dangerous proposals being presented by the White House, such as Most Favored Nations, which will stifle the next generation of cures. The next breakthrough is already being researched in a laboratory somewhere today, maybe even in North Carolina.
We should be doing everything we can to support the innovation that gives patients and families hope when they need it most, right here in America.
Ronnie Condrey