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Cancer Screenings Save Lives

Floor Speech

Date: May 16, 2023
Location: Washington, DC

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Mr. PAYNE. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to discuss the Colorectal Cancer Payment Fairness Act. It is a bill that I reintroduced today to include more colorectal screenings. Everyone knows that cancer screenings save lives.

My bill provides Medicare beneficiaries with complete coverage for cancer treatments performed during routine screenings by the end of this year.

Right now screenings are covered but treatments are not, so patients can wake up after the procedure with a surprise medical bill upwards of $2,000.

Colorectal cancer is one of the deadliest cancers that we have, but it has one of the highest survival rates, if detected and treated early.

Too many Americans put off routine cancer screenings because they feel fine and worry about coverage. That can be a life-threatening decision.

This issue is very personal to me. I lost my father, the honorable and respected Congressman Donald Payne, Sr., to colorectal cancer in 2012. I don't want other families to lose their fathers and loved ones because they did not get screened regularly.

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