Cornyn Honors Houstonian Nobel Prize Winner Dr. Jim Allison

‘Dr. Allison sometimes is referred to as the Godfather of Cancer Immunotherapy, and the drugs he has helped develop have now been approved to treat not only melanoma and lung cancer, but also Hodgkin’s lymphoma and cancers of the kidney, bladder, liver, and stomach.’

‘We have so much more to discover and understand. And with science advancing at practically lightning speed, I believe it’s not a question of if we cure cancer, but when.’

WASHINGTON – Today on the Senate floor, U.S. Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) honored Houstonian Dr. Jim Allison, who has won the 2018 Nobel Prize in Medicine. Excerpts of his remarks are below, and video can be found here.

“Dr. Jim Allison, affiliated with the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, won the Nobel Prize in Medicine, along with a researcher from Japan. This is really important work, and it was a culmination of 25 years of effort, and I’m sure something Jim would have never even dreamed of as he grew up in the small town of Alice, Texas.”

“Dr. Allison sometimes is referred to as the Godfather of Cancer Immunotherapy, and the drugs he has helped develop have now been approved to treat not only melanoma and lung cancer, but also Hodgkin’s lymphoma and cancers of the kidney, bladder, liver, and stomach.”

“Much of this work, of course, would not be possible without the funding that’s provided by the American taxpayer through state and federal funding.”

“We have increased funding by $2 billion to the National Institutes of Health, and with that, an increase of close to $6 billion is now going to the National Cancer Institute and an additional $100 million is being put toward the so-called Cancer Moonshot.”

“Dr. Allison, who I mentioned earlier, has spoken about how crucial this government funding effort really is… While biotech and pharmaceutical companies fund the late-stage research that brings well-developed therapies into clinical trials, the early funding of basic science which makes that possible often comes from the money provided by the U.S. government through the National Institutes of Health. Without it, Dr. Allison said many of the therapies that currently treat millions of cancer patients worldwide simply wouldn’t exist.”

“The science and the developments, the research and the cures that are developed at places like MD Anderson Hospital in Houston, Texas benefit the whole world.”

“I remember one of the last times I was at MD Anderson for a town hall meeting with Senator McConnell, the Majority Leader, and Senator John McCain, our recently departed colleague from Arizona. At the time, I was told that patients from 90 different countries come to MD Anderson in Houston, Texas because of their expertise treating cancer. So this is not just a local or national phenomenon. This is a worldwide phenomenon.”

“We have so much more to discover and understand. And with science advancing at practically lightning speed, I believe it’s not a question of if we cure cancer, but when.”

“Cancer respects no persons and observes no differences between wealthy and the poor, or race, or ethnicity. But if we’re lucky, we’re also blessed to know cancer survivors, who thanks to medical innovation have a new shot at life.”

“Working with generous donors as well as the undaunted scientific researchers like Dr. Allison and his team, I hope we’ll continue to ply our time and talents to finding answers and yielding newer and even greater discoveries. And to all the younger generation out there – some of them in towns not unlike Alice, Texas – to all of them wondering what they might like to be when they grow up, well, look no further than Jim Allison… He’s a good example of the type of person you can aspire to be and what is possible if you try.”