OLYMPIA, Wash. –– As Washington residents face soaring health insurance costs and with hundreds of thousands at risk of losing life-saving coverage, the Washington Legislature can help ease that damage by maintaining funding for the Commercial Tobacco Prevention Program as well as the Breast, Cervical and Colon Health Program.
Further cuts to these programs would increase the cancer burden in Washington, where nearly 49,000 will be diagnosed with cancer during 2026 and 14,160 will die. These programs were already cut in the FY 2026 state budget.
The following quote can be attributed in full or in part to Audrey Miller Garcia, Washington government relations director for the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network:
“These cuts literally mean lives lost. This is not political posturing. It’s based in data and is not a possibility but an inevitability. These are not just financial decisions, but choices about who will and will not have access to the needed tools to detect, treat and, really, survive a cancer diagnosis. The potential for budget cuts to do serious damage to the health of Washington residents needs to be understood fully by the Governor and others making these decisions. Colorectal, breast and cervical cancer are three of the biggest killers in Washington. Previous budget cuts already cut colorectal screening from the state program. Further eroding the methods used to control them cannot be the way forward. Tobacco use costs the state thousands of lives and $3.26 billion each year. Significant cuts to tobacco prevention and cessation or the Breast, Cervical, and Colon Screening Program will damage Washington families well beyond their bank accounts. The cost will be the health of our children and lives of our loved ones.”