{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.alexander.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/pressreleases?ContentRecord_id=150122DE-6A9E-46C6-A99C-62536B911D43", "Alexander: President Signs Christmas Medical Miracle That Will Help Virtually Every American Family", "2016-12-13", "2016", "2016-12", "Republican", "House", "TN", "Lamar Alexander", "A000360", "www.alexander.senate.gov", null, null, "legacy", "WASHINGTON, December 13 \u2014 Senator Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.) today said President Obama signed into law a \u201cChristmas Medical Miracle,\u201d the 21st Century Cures Act, which has been called \u201cthe most important legislation of the year\u201d by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and has the potential to help virtually every American family. Alexander was the chief Senate sponsor of the legislation along with Senator Patty Murray (D-Wash).\r\n\u201cThe real winners today are American families whose lives stand to be improved by the legislation signed into law. For the second consecutive year, President Obama has signed another Christmas miracle. Last year, it was the Every Student Succeeds Act, which restored control of K-12 education back to Tennessee and helps 50 million children in our nation\u2019s 100,000 public schools. This year, it\u2019s the 21st Century Cures Act \u2013 a law that will help virtually every family across Tennessee and America.\u201d\r\nSenator Alexander continued: \u201cThis bipartisan law will help us take advantage of the breathtaking advances in biomedical research and bring those innovations to doctors\u2019 offices and patients\u2019 medicine cabinets in Tennessee. This law will advance Vice President Biden\u2019s moonshot to find cures for cancer and President Obama\u2019s Precision Medicine Initiative. It also helps states like Tennessee fight on the front lines against opioid abuse and helps the one in five Tennessee adults suffering from a mental illness get the care they need.\u201d\r\nAlexander, chairman of the\u00a0Senate\u2019s health committee, has worked on the legislation for two years, held 12 hearings, 5 working groups, and passed 19 bipartisan bills that make up much of the policy signed into law today. \u00a0Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, called the bill \u201cthe most important legislation Congress will pass this year.\u201d President Obama called it an \u201copportunity we just can\u2019t miss.\u201d Vice President Biden called it \u201ca big step for cancer research and the cancer moonshot.\u201d Speaker Paul Ryan made the bill a centerpiece of his vision for our country\u2019s future.\r\nThe law will help drive the research discoveries predicted over the next decade by Dr. Francis Collins, the director of the National Institutes of Health, including the development of an artificial pancreas, organs built from patients' own stem cells, non-addictive painkillers, an HIV/AIDS\u00a0vaccine and a Zika vaccine.\r\nOpioid abuse in Tennessee:\r\nThe law helps fund the fight against opioid abuse \u2013 which takes the lives of more Tennesseans annually than gun shots or car wrecks \u2013 with $1 billion in grants to states over two years. In September of last year, Dr. Tom Frieden, Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, came to Knoxville where and hosted a roundtable with local physicians, community leaders, and public health officials on ways to fight opioid abuse. He called opioid abuse \u201ca growing epidemic that is gripping our country.\u201d Tennessee ranks near the top for opioid abuse, with the third highest rate of abuse in the nation. \u200eMore than 1,000 Tennesseans die each year as a result of drug overdose.\r\nMental health in Tennessee:\r\nThe law strengthens and improves important mental health programs for the first time in over a decade, so that the one in five adult Tennesseans suffering from a mental health disorder can get the care they need. From 2012 to 2013, nearly 21 percent of adults in Tennessee reported having a mental illness, according to the Tennessee Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse Services.\r\nPrecision Medicine:\r\nThe law supports the President\u2019s Precision Medicine Initiative \u2013 a plan to map the genomes of 1 million volunteers and make the data available to researchers so they can develop treatments and cures tailored to a patient\u2019s genome, rather than one-size-fits-all treatments. The bill grants NIH more flexibility to make it easier for the agency to forge partnerships such as the recent $71.6 million, five year grant to Vanderbilt University Medical Center which puts Vandy \u201cfront and center\u201d in the president\u2019s Precision Medicine Initiative.\r\nElectronic Health Records:\r\nThe law improves electronic health records so it\u2019s easier for Tennessee patients to access their records and for doctors and hospitals to get the information they need to treat patients. A family physician in Kingsport, TN told the New York Times last year: \u201cWe have electronic records at our clinic, but the hospital, which I can see from my window, has a separate system from a different vendor. The two don\u2019t communicate. When I admit patients to the hospital, I have to print out my notes and send a copy to the hospital so they can be incorporated into the hospital\u2019s electronic records.\u201d\r\nRegenerative medicine:\r\nThe law will also help more people take advantage of regenerative medicine\u2014 an area of medicine where a person\u2019s own cells are used to repair and rebuild organs and heal disease. A year and a half ago, Nashville resident Doug Oliver was legally blind. Today, he can see. Vanderbilt doctors told Mr. Oliver that there was no cure for the inherited form of Macular Degeneration that had gradually stolen his eyesight. After Oliver found a clinical trial in Florida, doctors extracted his own cells from his hip bone, spun them in a FDA-cleared centrifuge, and injected the appropriately isolated cells into his retina. Oliver\u2019s left eye vision improved from 20/2000 to 20/40 and his right eye improved from 20/400 to 20/30. Last December, Doug received his Tennessee driver\u2019s license 11 years after surrendering it because of blindness. Today, he is busy advising lawmakers in Washington about how this law will help more patients.\r\nBackground on the 21st Century Cures Act:\r\n \r\nHelps bring safe drugs and devices to market more quickly and at less cost by making needed reforms to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), including: expedited review for breakthrough devices, increased patient involvement in the drug approval process, a streamlined review process for combination products that are both a drug and device, and freedom from red tape for software like fitbits or calorie counting apps.\r\nProvides $4.8 billion to National Institutes of Health, including: $1.8 billion for Vice President Biden\u2019s \"Cancer Moonshot\u201d to speed cancer research; $1.4 billion for President Obama\u2019s Precision Medicine Initiative to drive research into the genetic, lifestyle and environmental variations of disease; and $1.6 billion for the BRAIN Initiative to improve our understanding of diseases like Alzheimer's and speed diagnosis and treatment.\r\nProvides $500 million to the FDA.\r\nProvides $1 billion in grants to states to address the opioid crisis.\r\nAddresses the country\u2019s mental health crisis and help the one out of five adult Americans suffering from mental illness receive the care they need.\r\nImproves electronic health records for doctors and their patients.\u00a0\r\n \r\nOne-pagers on the 21st Century Cures Act:\r\n \r\nSummary of what the 21st Century Cures Act does HERE.\r\nHow Cures will bring safe drugs and medical devices to patients faster HERE.\r\nHow Cures support states in the fight against the opioid abuse epidemic HERE.\r\nHow Cures supports the one in five adults suffering from a mental illness HERE.\r\nHow Cures delivers a fully-offset surge of targeted funding to tackle costly diseases and opioid abuse HERE.\r\nHow Cures encourages innovation and cuts red tape that stifles competition in the drug marketplace, which keeps many drug prices too high for Americans HERE.\r\nHow Cures supports Vice President Biden\u2019s moonshot to find cures for cancer and the President\u2019s Precision Medicine Initiative to find more personalized treatments and cures: HERE and HERE.\r\nHow the bill helps improve operations at the Food and Drug Administration and the National Institutes of Health HERE.\r\nHow the bill improves electronic health records for better patient care HERE. \u00a0\r\n \r\n\u00a0\r\n###", 1, "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z", "2026-03-30T12:14:52Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.alexander.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/pressreleases?ContentRecord_id=150122DE-6A9E-46C6-A99C-62536B911D43"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.6672599595040083, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}