Doctors and parents of young cancer patients made an emotional plea to state legislators Sept. 17 "to make funding for pediatric cancer a priority," Jacqueline Pitts reports for cn|2's "Pure Politics."
Lobbyist Jamie Bloyd told the Interim Joint Committee on Health and Welfare about her son, Paxton Bloyd, who was diagnosed with stage 4 Burkitt’s Lymphoma in March, and quoted Sen. Chris McDaniel, R-Taylor Mill, as telling the Bloyd family in the hospital “that $10 million of our budget goes to dental care for inmates. But zero dollars go to pediatric cancer research in Kentucky and I just think that is sickening, I think our kids deserve better than our inmates do.”
Max Wise of Campbellsville, who defeated Sen. Sara Beth Gregory of Monticello in the Republican primary, "attended the meeting with his son who is a pediatric cancer survivor," Pitts reports. "In an interview with Pure Politics after the meeting, Wise also noted some of the efforts discussed by Lucas as well as the St. Baldrick’s Foundation and said that there are encouraging signs that there are people looking to help find solutions."
“Government isn’t always the solution,” Wise said. “Maybe it is other organizations that chip in, if it is charities, if it's corporations,” Wise said. “It's little things along the way that everyone can chip in on this and it should not be ‘Let’s just look to government to solve this;’ there’s other sources out there which can play a big part.”
The meeting was held at the offices of the Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky in suburban Louisville.
Lobbyist Jamie Bloyd told the Interim Joint Committee on Health and Welfare about her son, Paxton Bloyd, who was diagnosed with stage 4 Burkitt’s Lymphoma in March, and quoted Sen. Chris McDaniel, R-Taylor Mill, as telling the Bloyd family in the hospital “that $10 million of our budget goes to dental care for inmates. But zero dollars go to pediatric cancer research in Kentucky and I just think that is sickening, I think our kids deserve better than our inmates do.”
Max Wise of Campbellsville, who defeated Sen. Sara Beth Gregory of Monticello in the Republican primary, "attended the meeting with his son who is a pediatric cancer survivor," Pitts reports. "In an interview with Pure Politics after the meeting, Wise also noted some of the efforts discussed by Lucas as well as the St. Baldrick’s Foundation and said that there are encouraging signs that there are people looking to help find solutions."
“Government isn’t always the solution,” Wise said. “Maybe it is other organizations that chip in, if it is charities, if it's corporations,” Wise said. “It's little things along the way that everyone can chip in on this and it should not be ‘Let’s just look to government to solve this;’ there’s other sources out there which can play a big part.”
The meeting was held at the offices of the Foundation for a Healthy Kentucky in suburban Louisville.
