Today, in honor of Mother’s Day on Sunday, Congressman Jerrold Nadler re-introduced the Mammogram and MRI Availability Act, a crucial women’s health initiative that would require insurance companies that cover diagnostic mammograms to also cover annual screening mammograms for women 40 and older, and MRI screenings for high-risk women.  While annual screening mammograms, which are used to detect tumors that cannot be felt manually, are already covered under Medicare and Medicaid, many private insurers currently cover only diagnostic mammograms, the type of mammography used to confirm the presence of a tumor only after it has been detected.

“The Mammogram and MRI Availability Act is an important tool for protecting American women – our mothers, wives, sisters and daughters – and saving lives,” said Nadler.  “When it comes to breast cancer, prevention is often the difference between life and death.  Study after study has found that yearly mammograms help find tumors at their most treatable stage.  The fact that many private insurers still refuse to cover basic screening mammography is shameful.  The decision whether to have a mammogram should be made by doctors and patients, depending on family history and other risk factors, and not on the basis of cost.”

Breast cancer is the second leading cause of cancer death in American women.  The American Cancer Society (ACS) and the National Cancer Institute (NCI) have both recommended that women over 40 have a mammogram at least once every one or two years.  ACS issued guidelines urging annual MRIs for women at high risk for breast cancer – a category that covers as many as 1.6 million women in America.

The NCI estimates that breast cancer claimed the lives of nearly 40,000 women in the U.S last year.  In 2010, 207,000 new cases were detected.  While breast cancer is often treatable, early detection through mammograms and MRIs is essential to prevent the rapid spread of this deadly disease.

                                                            ###