Biden relaunches Moonshot with aim to cut cancer deaths by at least 50% in 25 years
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President Joe Biden has unfinished business with cancer.
On Wednesday, he relaunched the Cancer Moonshot program, an initiative he spearheaded in 2016 as vice president and one he is reigniting with a goal to “end cancer as we know it.”
“In the last 2 years, the COVID-19 pandemic has taken more than 800,000 American lives. In that same period of time, cancer has claimed 1.2 million American lives,” Biden said during a press conference at the White House.
“For all of those we lost, for all those we miss, we can end cancer as we know it,” he continued. “I committed to this when I was vice president and it’s one of the reasons, quite frankly, that I ran for president. Let there be no doubt, now that I am president, that this is a presidential White House priority, period.”
Among the chief objectives of what Biden called “the [administration’s] plan to supercharge” the Moonshot initiative is to reduce the cancer death rate by at least 50% over the next 25 years.
Biden and first lady Jill Biden, PhD, also promised to work toward improving the experience of people and families living with cancer. They issued a call to action on cancer screening and early detection in an effort to make up for millions of missed screenings during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Bidens’ history with cancer has been well documented.
Beau Biden, the president’s oldest child, lost a 5-year battle with cancer in May of 2015, when he died at age 46 years due to glioblastoma multiforme. Thursday would have been the younger Biden’s 53rd birthday.
“Certain words have the power to make time stop. Malignant. Aggressive. Terminal. Cancer. Like a spell, they still the air around us. Frozen in place, we feel the world around us slipping away,” Jill Biden said. “Together, we will give Americans a reason to hope. We will use the power of this White House to make your life better. And we will build a future where the word ‘cancer’ forever loses its power.”
Among the new goals for Cancer Moonshot are:
- to diagnose cancer sooner, including recommitting to regular screening and expanding traditional screening;
- to take lessons learned in modern science, including in mRNA technology and through learning about environmental exposures, to work toward preventing cancer;
- to reduce inequities that exist, ensuring all Americans (rural, urban, tribal, etc.) have access to cutting-edge cancer diagnostics, therapeutics and clinical trials;
- to target the right treatments for the right patients, using information about genetics and immune responses to customize care;
- to invest in a new, robust pipeline of new treatments and accelerate trials, without compromising safety and effectiveness, to speed research toward treating the most deadly and rare cancers; and
- to learn from patients (using data while respecting privacy) and support them, their caregivers and survivors through the medical, financial and emotional burdens.
“The goal is to cut the cancer death rate in half in the next 25 years at least by 50% and to turn death sentences to chronic diseases that people can live with, to create a more supportive experience for patients and their families,” Biden said. “It’s bold, it’s ambitious, but it’s completely doable. Just as we harnessed the science to develop the cutting-edge COVID-19 vaccines and treatments, we’ll bring a fierce sense of urgency to the fight against cancer.”
The cancer care community expressed eagerness to continue working with government officials to fuel Moonshot’s progress.
“ACS and ACS CAN commit to continue this fight alongside the president, his administration and Congress by accelerating discovery, improving access to services patients and their families need, and advancing public policy that will change the trajectory of this disease,” Karen E. Knudsen, PhD, MBA, CEO of American Cancer Society and American Cancer Society Action Network, said in a statement. “Marshalling the resources of the federal government will be critical in our ability to reduce death and suffering from this disease.”
Margaret Foti, PhD, MD (hc), CEO of American Association for Cancer Research, echoed the need for government funding.
“If we are to achieve the goals that the president outlined for us today, it is going to require that the president work with Congress to finalize the fiscal year 2022 appropriations process with robust funding increases for NIH and NCI, as well as announce significant investments in cancer research as part of his FY2023 budget request,” Foti said in a statement.
The reignited Moonshot could help researchers achieve greater progress not only against cancer but also toward equity, diversity and inclusion, Howard A. “Skip” Burris III, MD, FACP, FASCO, board chair of ASCO, said in a statement.
“For all the progress we’ve made to improve cancer prevention, screening, care and outcomes for patients, stubborn disparities continue to persist,” Burris said. “ASCO and other stakeholders have been working on this issue for more than a decade, and with support from the administration, we hope that we’ll be able to accelerate this progress and make headway towards true equity in cancer.”
Ted Okon, MBA, executive director of Community Oncology Alliance, expressed support for the Moonshot relaunch and its emphasis on cancer screening and health disparities.
“We encourage the Cancer Moonshot to look toward independent oncology practices, often in rural and underserved communities, for the innovative solutions they are already implementing to address the serious, pernicious problem of cancer disparities,” he said in a statement.
Okon also urged the Biden administration to extend the Oncology Care Model, which he said has improved the experience for patients with cancer.
“Ending federal support for the single largest effort to transform cancer care in the United States without a successor plan is totally incongruous with the Moonshot’s goals,” he said.
The administration’s pledge to expand cancer prevention efforts and ensure equal access to treatments and screenings will help reduce some of the pandemic’s negative impact, according to Laura A. Dawson, MD, FASTRO, chair of American Society for Radiation Oncology board of directors.
“Multiple studies show that inequitable access is driving disparate outcomes,” Dawson said in a statement. “Today's announcement highlights the critical need for multidisciplinary collaboration and prioritization of cancer research and screening to reverse these alarming trends.”
References:
AACR statement on President Biden’s new Cancer Moonshot announcement. https://www.aacr.org/about-the-aacr/newsroom/news-releases/aacr-statement-on-president-bidens-new-cancer-moonshot-announcement/. Published Feb. 2, 2022. Accessed Feb. 2, 2022.
Moonshot expansion offers opportunity to increase equity in cancer, recover progress on screening. https://www.asco.org/about-asco/press-center/news-releases/moonshot-expansion-offers-opportunity-increase-equity-cancer. Published Feb. 2, 2022. Accessed Feb. 2, 2022.
Radiation oncologists applaud Biden-Harris administration's renewed commitment to Cancer Moonshot. https://www.astro.org/News-and-Publications/News-and-Media-Center/News-Releases/2022/Radiation-oncologists-applaud-Biden-Harris-adminis. Published Feb. 2, 2022. Accessed Feb. 2, 2022.
Statement from Community Oncology Alliance Executive Director Ted Okon on the Cancer Moonshot relaunch. https://communityoncology.org/category/press-releases. Published Feb. 2, 2022. Accessed Feb. 2, 2022.
White House shines national spotlight on cancer to reignite moonshot. http://pressroom.cancer.org/Moonshot2022. Published Feb. 2, 2022. Accessed Feb. 2, 2022.
Perspective
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Jon Chernoff, MD, PhD
The revived Moonshot program comes at an opportune time.
Since the declaration of the “war on cancer” in 1971, researchers and clinicians have made amazing advances in the detection and treatment of many types of cancer, but it is painfully apparent that we have a long, long way to go. Even with improved, targeted therapies, most solid tumors remain incurable if metastatic, and we need to change that tragic situation.
The Moonshot, if executed properly, might enable teams of researchers to take on some of the “big-ticket items” that have limited progress. For example, although we have identified the vast majority of gene mutations that lead to cancer, and in many cases have devised targeted drug therapies based on this knowledge, we know far less about how cancer cells develop resistance to such therapies and how to overcome this resistance. We have similar gaps in knowledge regarding how to prevent cancer from forming in the first place, and the best way to screen for cancer early in its course.
If the Moonshot can promote innovative, risk-taking research in such key problem areas, the end of the war on cancer might be entering its final phases.
Fox Chase Cancer Center
Perspective
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Candace S. Johnson, PhD
This initiative is going to save lives.
The entire cancer community has been poised to advance some really out-of-the-box approaches to treatment and early detection, and these funds will help us catapult those efforts into practice.
There have been so many advances and so much promise in cancer research, particularly with the use of the immune system to fight cancer. One example is chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy for some acute leukemias and lymphomas. Previously, they were almost certainly deadly. Now we are using the “C-word” — cure — as some patients who receive these therapies have no evidence of disease.
That truly is remarkable, and there is a lot of promise about the potential to extend some of those incredible therapies into other diseases. It takes money to conduct those clinical trials, and the moonshot will help facilitate this. Hopefully, we will be able to see some really exciting innovation over the next 3 to 5 years.
The beauty of this is that the money allocated toward cancer research leads to more money. Our calculations are that, for every dollar we receive, we turn it into $13 or $14 worth of new money for cancer research. This will have a huge impact because it will lead to more funds for this deadly disease.
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