President Joe Biden has relaunched a project aiming to half the death rate from cancer over the next 25 years, with an unveiling event from the White House.
Cancer Moonshot is a research initiative aimed at centralizing treatment and response, bolstering government support for research and—ultimately—to eradicate the disease.
Biden first launched the project in 2016 as vice-president in Barack Obama's administration. Biden's son, Beau, died from brain cancer in 2015 at the age of 46.
The project's initial operations were suspended in 2019, shortly after Biden announced his presidential bid.
In a statement, the White House said: "It's now possible to set ambitious goals: to reduce the death rate from cancer by at least 50 percent over the next 25 years, and improve the experience of people and their families living with and surviving cancer— and, by doing this and more, end cancer as we know it today."
The relaunch is set to be unveiled later on Wednesday at the White House, where President Biden will be joined by first lady Jill Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.
The renewed project's unveiling is scheduled to take place at 1:30 p.m. ET. A livestream of the event will be available on the White House's YouTube channel, and the event is likely to be broadcast on most news outlets and C-Span.
Cancer death rates in the U.S. dropped 27 percent in the 20 years from 1999 to 2019, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
More than a million people are diagnosed with cancer in the U.S. each year. In 2019, nearly 600,000 Americans died of cancer; lung, colorectal, breast, pancreatic, and prostate cancers were the deadliest, according to CDC figures.
By relaunching the project, Biden hopes to mobilize the government in order to achieve his goal of cancer eradication, and has called for an "all-hands-on-deck."
As part of that, Biden will form a White House "Cancer Cabinet" made up of up to 18 different national departments and government agencies working to tackle cancer "on multiple fronts."
The White House is also encouraging Americans to seek cancer screenings.
The statement urged people to "to get back on track" after more than 9.5 million missed cancer screenings in the United States since the COVID-19 pandemic began.
"With regular recommended screenings, we can often catch cancer when there may be more effective treatment options or even prevent it from developing," the statement said.
As part of revamped project, the Biden administration will also host talks on early detection, cancer prevention, clinical trials, patient support, and more.
The project has been in the works for several months. Last June, Biden appointed neuroscientist Danielle Carnival, a veteran of the original project, to oversee the revived version.
Last January, a group of scientists urged Biden to reinstate his Moonshot project.
Writing in the medical journal The Lancet, the group of scientists and researchers outlined which areas a revamped project could help with, including new tumor and patient-specific technologies, new drug delivery systems, nanotechnologies and cellular engineered products, among others.
Biden also established The Biden Cancer Initiative, created in 2017, as a way of centralizing cancer research and uniting researchers' forces to help tackle the disease.
The cause is a deeply personal issue for Biden.
Upon first unveiling the project at the Rose Garden six years ago, Biden said: "If I could be anything, I would have wanted to have been the president that ended cancer, because it's possible."
Uncommon Knowledge
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Newsweek is committed to challenging conventional wisdom and finding connections in the search for common ground.
