GOP Candidate Chris Collins: 'People Now Don't Die From Prostate Cancer, Breast Cancer'

[ElizabethB]

21. Okay, but this isn't just "politics" for me

Insurers can now use the US Preventive Services Task Force ruling as a reason to stop covering mammograms and prostate cancer testing for women under 50 and men under 70. The government can't very well prosecute a private insurer that chooses not to cover tests that the US government itself has ruled as "unnecessary" now can they? And, the government healthcare program isn't going to cover something it has deemed as unnecessary. Use your common sense! Why do you think the mammogram holding resulted in such public outrage by women? And why did the USPSTF website have shut down after their decision on PSA testing?

The PSA test is just a simple blood test. It's also the ONLY test available at present!! If prostate cancer is caught within the prostate there is almost a 100% survival rate...if it's not (as was the case with my Dad), it's a death sentence. Testing is expensive, and I can't help but think that the USPTSF decision was just a risk/loss analysis. If men aren't screened they will only find out if they have prostate cancer once they are exhibiting actual symptoms and it has metastasized.

My Dad, two uncles, and one cousin were all diagnosed with prostate cancer in the past five years. These men are not all related to each other either (different sides of the family). My Dad is the only one that didn't catch it and after watching him go through chemo, radiation, and hormone therapy for three years...my heart is absolutely broken. Now he takes the PSA test weekly to monitor how his chemo is working. He starts second line therapy next week (stage IV). I'm damn grateful that my other relatives and my Dad at least had a chance to fight it. It kills me that we are going to see a return to pre-PSA statistics.

Can you explain how this decision won't result in a certain number of "expendable lives"? How is this not healthcare rationing?