This week the House Appropriations Committee included AGA-provided language on gastric and esophageal cancers in the FY25 Labor, Health and Human Services report.
Gastric and esophageal cancers rates are rising and have a low five-year survival rate and are highly fatal due to the lack of screening – despite both cancers typically being associated with reduced mortality. Delays in diagnosis lead to poor prognoses when the cancer is already at an advanced stage.
Additionally, these cancers receive disproportionately low funding and have the lowest ratio of funding to lethality to any other cancer.
That’s why it’s crucial to close the gap and increase screening for GI cancers that are less commonly screened for.
AGA’s provided language encourages NIH to develop, test and implement screening strategies for gastric and esophageal cancers using non-endoscopic screening modalities, personalized clinical risk stratification for screenings and biomarker-based risk-stratification.
Why is this important?
This submission is the first time AGA language on gastric and esophageal cancer has been requested and included in the committee’s report. This illustrates the Committee’s recognition of the importance of GI cancer detection and the work being done by NIH.
What does this mean for GI?
This is an important first step to increasing access to cancer screenings! We look forward to working with our champions on Capitol Hill to increase patient access GI cancer screenings.
