Fighting Cancer Requires Health Care Reform

To successfully fight cancer and other diseases, we need to first fix our nation's health care system.

Just think -- over half a million Americans will die of cancer in 2009. And the cost of health care coverage for the average worker has doubled in the last decade, and health insurance premiums have tripled, while wages haven't kept pace. At this rate, Americans will spend close to half of their incomes on health care by 2016.

Additionally, cancer patients -- including those with insurance -- often must dig deep into their savings and risk financial ruin to pay for cancer treatment and care.

Not to mention the approximately 45 million Americans who are without health insurance.

To address this growing problem -- we need health care reform legislation that:

* puts prevention at the forefront nation's health care system
* is affordable and accessible to all Americans
* ensures the people who have serious medical conditions like cancer are covered when they need to be
* is simple to understand and manage for consumers.