Jerry Moran: “this amendment simply earmarks an additional $1.9 million within the Office of the Director of NIH for the Office of…”

“this amendment simply earmarks an additional $1.9 million within the Office of the Director of NIH for the Office of Alternative Medicine. It does not increase the budget. In fact, as I say, this is unallocated money, but I think it is terribly important that we put a little bit more money into the Office of Alternative Medicine. You know, 80 percent of the world's medicine is considered alternative medicine. It is amazing, the fact that 80 percent of the rest of the world uses different therapies than the conventional therapies that we use in the United States and that, in fact, 50 percent of the American people who are faced with a very serious illness like cancer try alternative medicines. In fact, they pay out of pocket about $10 billion. As much as they pay out of pocket for hospital care, they are paying out of pocket, uninsured, for alternative approaches to traditional medicine. Now, Mr. Chairman, I came across this issue because of a personal experience in our family. My child had a malignant brain tumor and had maybe a 10- to 20-percent chance of living up to the age of 5, we were told, and so it was recommended to take the traditional approach, which is surgery, chemotherapy and radiation. Essentially cut, poison, and burn. The surgery was not able to get all of the tumor and so we gave her chemotherapy. We soon realized, the debilitating effect that chemotherapy was having on her.”