Ben Cardin: “today I introduce the Colon Cancer Screen for Life Act of 2007 along with my colleagues, Senator Collins, Senator…”

“today I introduce the Colon Cancer Screen for Life Act of 2007 along with my colleagues, Senator Collins, Senator Lieberman, and Senator Graham. Many people are aware that colon cancer is the second most deadly cancer in the United States. In 2006 alone, according to the American Cancer Society, more than 150,000 new cases were diagnosed and more than 50,000 Americans died from colon cancer. In my own State of Maryland, nearly 1,000 people lost their lives to this disease last year. What people are not as aware of, however, is that colon cancer is preventable with appropriate screening, highly detectable, and curable if found early. The purpose of our bill is to increase the rate of participation in colon cancer screening and ensure that we are saving every life that we can from this deadly disease. Medicare coverage for colorectal cancer screening through colonoscopy was authorized in the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 and further expanded in 2000 when the colonoscopy benefit was added for high risk beneficiaries. Under this Medicare benefit, a low risk beneficiary is entitled to receive a colonoscopy once every ten years and a high risk beneficiary is entitled to a colonoscopy every two years. Despite this, recent studies have shown that patients are not utilizing coverage of CRC preventive screenings.”