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Congress passes revised 21st Century Cures Act
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In a 392 to 26 vote, the U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday passed a reworked version of the 21st Century Cures Act, which aims to provide additional funding to the NIH and FDA while streamlining the development of new drugs and antibiotics.
Introduced by U.S. Reps. Fred Upton, R-Mich., chairman of the Energy and Commerce Committee; and Diana DeGette, D-Colo.; the revised 21st Century Cures Act would provide the NIH with $4.8 billion in new funding that is fully offset, according to a fact-sheet provided by the Energy and Commerce Committee. The money is expected to help advance the Precision Medicine Initiative and provide $1.5 billion to drive research into genetic, lifestyle and environmental variations of disease, provide $1.8 billion to bolster Vice President Joe Biden’s “Cancer Moonshot” initiative; and invest in the BRAIN initiative to improve understanding of diseases including Alzheimer’s.
Fred Upton
Diana DeGette
In addition, the reworked version includes an “Antimicrobial Innovation and Stewardship” provision that focuses on new requirements relating to antimicrobial use, stewardship and the development of new antimicrobials.
Now that the revised 21st Century Cures Act has passed in the House, the bill will go before the Senate — where it stalled in 2015 — for approval.
“With [this] overwhelming bipartisan vote, we took a giant leap forward … ” Upton and DeGette said in a press release. “21st Century Cures is the innovation game-changer that patients, their loved ones, and the nation’s researchers and scientists so desperately need. The White House has expressed its enthusiastic endorsement of this critical legislation.”
Perspective
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Louise M. Dembry, MD, FACP, MS, MBA
The passage of the 21st Century Cures Act through the House of Representatives demonstrates Congress’ strong commitment to controlling the threat of antimicrobial resistance through science-based policy. This renewed national commitment to tackle antibiotic resistance will create new requirements relating to antimicrobial use, stewardship and the development of new antimicrobials, all of which are imperative to ensuring that effective antibiotic treatments will be readily available for generations of Americans to come.
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