Why Vice President Biden’s Cancer Moonshot Is A Game Changer

BCRF Joins an Unprecedented Collective Commitment to End Cancer

By Marc Hurlbert, PhD

In his final State of the Union address, President Obama tasked the Vice President with heading up a new national effort, the Cancer Moonshot. The ultimate goal is to double the rate of progress—to make a decade’s worth of advances in cancer research in five years—to ultimately end cancer as we know it. 

Since 1993, the Breast Cancer Research Foundation (BCRF) has been committed to ending breast cancer by advancing the world’s most promising research. The impact of our dedication is clear: BCRF has been involved in every major breakthrough in breast cancer research over the last twenty years. 

In response to Vice President Biden’s call for commitment, cooperation and collaboration, today, we announce an unprecedented goal of doubling our annual cancer research investment from $50 million to $100 million, aiming for a cumulative investment of $1 billion, by 2021. 

As the country’s largest non-governmental, nonprofit funder of breast cancer research, BCRF’s approach is multi-pronged: looking at the full spectrum of breast cancer research from prevention, diagnosis, treatment, survivorship and metastasis. 

With a bold vision to double our commitment, BCRF aims to accelerate the path from discovery to clinical implementation—improving treatment options for patients faster. We will launch a multi-million-dollar impact-investment program aimed at fostering productive teams to bring lifesaving, paradigm-changing discoveries to patients. 

Furthermore, BCRF intends to speed the understanding of what causes cancer in the first place—opening an avenue of discovery to stop it in its tracks or prevent it from occurring—by “connecting the dots” between amassing molecular information on tumors and how that sums together to cause the dozens of diseases we call cancer. 

To accomplish this, we will build on our twenty-three-year history of fostering collaborative science to convene and support an academy of biologists, physicians, physicists, mathematicians, computer scientists, lay advocates and other dedicated, creative individuals. 

The Cancer Moonshot aims to expand the very fabric on which BCRF was founded: to unite with others around research—the only way we’ll achieve a future beyond cancer. This Wednesday, we’ll join a collective group of organizations that are expanding their goals, working collaboratively and undoubtedly speeding our way to ending the devastating disease.

Editor's Note: This article originally appeared on The Huffington Post, June 28, 2016