Knoxville News Sentinel: Alexander proud of work on medical research bill pending in Senate

WASHINGTON — U.S. Sen. Lamar Alexander has had his hands on a lot of bills, but he believes none has been as far-reaching as the one he's working on now.

"I will probably never have a chance to work (again) on something this important as a U.S. senator," the Maryville Republican said.

Alexander and the committee he chairs completed work last week on the last of 19 bipartisan proposals that aim to speed up the approval of drugs and medical devices and boost funding for medical research into treatments and cures for diseases like cancer.

All of the proposals will be rolled into one bill and paired with a separate piece of legislation that would provide a one-time surge of funding for the National Institutes of Health to use on some of its research priorities.

If approved, the proposals will be the most important law enacted this year, Alexander said.

"There has never been a more remarkable time in biomedical research," said Alexander, chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.

"The reason the bill is so important," he said, "is it has the promise of improving the health and quality of life of virtually every American by moving new treatments and devices through the investment and regulatory process more rapidly and accelerating research at National Institutes of Health."

From a political standpoint, the proposals are remarkable because they have managed to draw broad support from Democrats and Republicans in a contentious presidential election year.

The bill would provide funding to launch his Precision Medicine Initiative, which seeks to tailor medication to an individual's specific biological needs, and provide additional money for innovative research as part of his "moonshot" initiative to eliminate cancer.

Beyond that, the bill would shorten the development of treatments to help people infected with life-threatening "super bugs" like MRSA, an infection caused by a type of staph bacteria that is resistant to many of the antibiotics used to treat ordinary staph infections.

It also will include funding to speed up research for a vaccine for the Zika virus and will enable scientists at the National Institutes of Health to concentrate on researching treatments and cures and spend less time on bureaucratic tasks, like filling out paperwork.

"We've heard from doctors that they spend half their time on paperwork and from patients who lug boxes of medical records from appointment to appointment," Alexander said.

"We've gotten rid of a lot of paperwork and unnecessary reporting that has wasted time and effort," he said.

Alexander hopes to send the bills to the Senate floor for approval within the next three or four weeks. But some issues still have to be resolved.

The U.S. House, for example, passed its own version of the legislation last year and named it the 21st Century Cures Act. The House bill called for $8.8 billion in mandatory funding over five years to support National Institutes of Health priorities.

The Senate has yet to agree upon a figure, and Senate Democrats are adamant that mandatory funding for the medical research center must be included.

Alexander said he's optimistic a deal can be reached. So is the committee's top Democrat, U.S. Sen. Patty Murray of Washington.

"If we can reach this agreement — and I believe that we can — we'd be able to make a real difference in the lives of patients and families across the country," she said.