ISSUE ISSUE 2430 TheTheVoiceVoice SPRING/SUMMER 2017 FOR PREVENTION, TREATMENT, AND POLICY SPRING/SUMMER 2014 FOR PREVENTION, TREATMENT, AND POLICY WHAT’S INSIDE National We’re in the Headlines…2 Antipsychotics & Young Kids: How Safe are They?...3 Center Making Our Voices Heard...4 for Health Matching Game for Medications...5 Research Right to Try? Or Right to be Exploited Before You Die?...6 We are dedicated to improving the health and Which Sunscreens Offer the Best Protection? safety of adults and children We all need 15 minutes of sunshine every day to by using research to develop benefit from vitamin D. Otherwise, staying out of the sun is important to prevent skin more effective treatments cancer. But, let’s face it, the sun feels good! In and policies. The Cancer addition to avoiding sun exposure in the hours Prevention and Treatment around noon, especially during the summer, sunscreen can also help protect you and yours Fund is our major program. from some of the damaging effects of the sun. But what kind of sunscreen is best? Spray or lotion? SPF 15 or SPF 70? Waterproof or moisturizing? It seems like new rules come out The Cancer every year. kids into the routine of applying sunscreen every Prevention and And it is important to know that the Food and morning (after they brush their teeth) before Treatment Fund Drug Administration (FDA) has never required going to school or to camp, no matter how cloudy sunscreens to be proven to prevent skin it is outside. But remember, they will need to add Our Cancer Prevention and cancer. They are only required to be proven to more if they are in the sun more than two hours prevent sunburn, and since sunburn increases later. Treatment Fund helps adults the chances of later skin cancer, sunscreens are and children reduce their risk assumed to prevent skin cancer. But some Which SPF to Use? sunscreens contain chemicals that can be of getting cancer and helps dangerous when used frequently. Sun protection factor (SPF) choices range from SPF 8 all the way up to SPF 100+. According to everyone get the best Skin Cancer the FDA, SPFs below 15 protect against sunburns, possible treatment. but they do not prevent damage that can cause Spending too much time in the sun puts you at skin cancer. On the other hand, very high SPFs risk for skin cancer, and so does sunburn. There are misleading since SPF 30 protects against 97% are three types of skin cancer: basal cell, of UV rays, SPF 50 protects against 98%, and SPF squamous cell, and melanoma. Basal cell Cancer Helpline: 100 protects against 99%. Sunscreens with the cancers, the most common, are slow growing highest SPFs cost more and provide little [email protected] and are the easiest to treat. Squamous cell additional protection, and they also encourage cancers detected at an early stage are curable people to stay out in the sun longer and reapply and cause minimal damage. Melanoma is the less frequently. For effective sun protection, look Websites: least common but most dangerous kind of skin for an SPF between 15 and 50. cancer. If not caught early, it can spread www.center4research.org throughout the body and become fatal. In addition, make sure to choose “broad- spectrum” sunscreen, which guards against both www.stopcancerfund.org Most melanomas result from sun exposure, UVB and UVA rays. While only 10% of UV especially for people with fair skin. Sunscreen radiation from the sun is UVB, this type of only lasts about 2 hours, so putting it on first radiation is the primary cause of sunburns, thing in the morning will not last all wrinkling, and skin cancer. UVA rays penetrate day. Research shows that applying sunscreen deep into the skin to cause premature aging, and every day reduces aging of the skin by 24%. with enough exposure can also damage DNA to CFC #11967 Protecting children from sunburns is especially cause cancer. important. Getting sunburns during childhood You may be surprised to learn increases the risk of cancer later in life. Get your Continued on Page 7 We’re in the Headlines! Board of Trump’s FDA Nominee Spurs Concerns About Cancer drugs may remain approved Drug Approvals, Off Directors -Label Promotion despite lack of benefit Reuters George Thomas Beall Bloomberg BNA Right to Try National Law WouldDecember Exploit 1, 2016 Former Managing Director March 14, 2017 Ogilvy Public Relations False Hope Sarah Deutsch, JD Counsel, Mayer Brown and 20 otherDiana newspapers Zuckerman, across Chicago the countryTribune The New York Times Trump Vows to Ease Rules for Drug January 31, 2017 Ben Gitterman, MD Makers, but Again Zeros In on Prices Associate Clinical Professor FDA Agrees With WHO, Links Breast Implants To March 19, 2017 Pediatrics and Public Health Rare Cancer. How Worried Should Women Be? George Washington University Don’t Give Kids Cough Syrup Or Pain Meds That Contain Codeine, FDA Says Mary G. Hager, MA Forbes Nancy Hardt, MD March 22, 2017 Retired Professor and Associate NPR Dean University of Florida College April 20, 2017 of Medicine Judith L. Harris, JD Right to Try? Or Right to be Exploited Before You Die? Partner, Reed Smith Diana Zuckerman, Our Bodies Ourselves Courtney McKeldin April 17, 2017 Retired Commissioner, Baltimore City Zoning Board In the U.S., cancer drugs are often approved based on The FDA now agrees with us and the World Health Organization (WHO) that breast implants can cause a Alan Mendelson, LLD preliminary studies showing the tumor shrinks. But the drugs usually stay on the market even if later rare type of cancer called anaplastic large cell Axion Venture Partners studies show they don't help patients live longer or lymphoma (ALCL). According to WHO, breast implant- better, according to our study published in JAMA associated ALCL is usually diagnosed about 10 years Omega Logan Silva, MD Internal Medicine. In New Republic, Reuters after breast implant surgery. We told Forbes that this Former President, American Health, Kaiser Health News, Barrons, and has been under-reported and misdiagnosed for years. Medical Women’s Association Stat News, NCHR’s president explained how Dr. Zuckerman's blog in Our Bodies Ourselves shocked we were to find that "these drugs don't save discusses why it took so long to warn women. Duchy Trachtenberg lives and don't improve quality of lives." Patients Former Councilmember deserve the most effective drugs, but instead too Montgomery County, MD many are spending their life savings on drugs that FDA will now require that cough, cold, or pain don’t work and make their remaining months medications with codeine or another narcotic, Susan F. Wood, PhD miserable. NCHR president Dr. Diana Zuckerman tramadol, have a label warning against use for children Associate Professor explained to The New York Times that when drugs under 12 and women who are breastfeeding. These George Washington University are hastily approved, patients end up with expensive drugs may also be dangerous for kids ages 12-18. treatments that don't work as well as older drugs. Diana Zuckerman, PhD NCHR and other experts testified about this in 2015 at President an FDA meeting. Dr. Zuckerman told NPR that "The Nat’l Center for Health Research science is clear, so why did it take almost 18 months since the FDA's public meeting on the exact same “Right to Try” laws that allow patients to have easier issue? FDA needs to do more to warn patients about access to experimental drugs promise more than they the known risks of medical products as soon as data can deliver. Patients already have a “right to try” are available." experimental treatments through a program where the We can’t be bought. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) provides safeguards and ensures that desperate patients aren't exploited by greedy doctors or companies. Dr. A new medical law was signed in December 2016, the Zuckerman's explanation of a proposed federal Right to Our Center doesn’t 21st Century Cures Act. It will make it easier for Try Act was featured in the Chicago Tribune and 20 companies to get faster FDA approval for their accept funding from other newspapers across the country, and also on the products, but what happens if those treatments don't Our Bodies Ourselves blog. Learn more on page 6. drug companies or actually work? Drugs that seem "promising" in early device manufacturers, studies often prove to be unsafe or ineffective when studied more carefully, Dr. Zuckerman told Fierce so we rely on the Biotech, The Hill, and Kaiser Health News. generosity of The nomination of new FDA Commissioner Scott individual donors. You Gottlieb has raised concerns because he has “extensive "We are flooding the market with medical products financial ties to the industries he'd be in charge of that don't work very well... and it's contributing can donate regulating and has shown more interest in reducing billions of dollars to the cost of Medicare, billions of online at regulations rather than enforcing them," Dr. Diana dollars to the cost of health insurance, and thousands Zuckerman told Bloomberg BNA. She told Stat of dollars per patient," Dr. Zuckerman explained to stopcancerfund.org. News that it isn’t possible to recuse these conflicts of NPR, WBUR, Wall Street Journal, CBS News, interest because his ties to pharmaceutical industry and New Republic. executives are so much a part of who Gottlieb is as a person. Page 2 Health Matters Antipsychotics & Young Kids: How Safe are They? Thank you to our This year, the FDA approved Latuda for the wonderful treatment of schizophrenia in children ages 13 to 17.