Prompted by SILive series, senator eyes funding for Staten Island-focused cancer study
Originally published in
Staten Island Advance
on
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STATEN ISLAND, N.Y. — Moved by the stories chronicled in the Staten Island Advance/SILive.com’s ongoing series “Cancer on Staten Island: The Search for Why,” state Sen. Jessica Scarcella-Spanton said she plans to push for state funding for a comprehensive study into the borough’s persistently high cancer rates.
“We have heard stories of recovery. We have heard stories of people who have had relapses with their cancer. We have heard people who have had different types of cancer. I think that we owe it to those people, the people behind those stories, to figure out why this is happening,” Scarcella-Spanton said on Friday.
Scarcella-Spanton said that is precisely why she believes the state needs to act.
“The study can dictate how we do better,” she said. “Are there environmental factors? What environmental factors are there? And then we can look at it from a government perspective of what we can do better to serve the people of Staten Island ... that is how I see it.”
Scarcella-Spanton stressed that her heightened focus on Staten Island’s cancer rates has been shaped by her personal relationships with Staten Islanders battling cancer and the stories she has read in the Advance/SILive.com series.
Two ‘big asks’
Scarcella-Spanton has co-authored the bill (S-5302) for colorectal cancer early detection beginning at age 35 with state Sen. Christopher J. Ryan of Central New York. State Assemblymember Charles Fall, a Democrat representing Staten Island’s North Shore, Lower Manhattan and parts of Brooklyn, is the sponsor of the bill (A-4029) in the Assembly.
“My two big asks this year are going to be lowering the age for colon cancer screenings and also trying to get money for a (cancer) study ... a really comprehensive study, on Staten Island,” Scarcella-Spanton said. “I think that if we do (the screenings push) it, in conjunction with the study, really fits nicely, hand-in-hand.”
“The statistics back up the need for this legislation,” she said of the need for colonoscopies in younger patients. “We’re seeing not just here on Staten Island, not just here in New York, but a national problem of higher colon cancer rates in younger people. So now more than ever, I think this is something that we need to get done.”
“The study can dictate how we do better,” she said. “Are there environmental factors? “What environmental factors are there? And then we can look at it from a government perspective of what we can do better to serve the people of Staten Island ... that is how I see it.”
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