On June 28, the Senate approved, by unanimous consent, a resolution (S. Res. 154) designating October 21, 2005, as “National Mammography Day.”
Sponsored by Sen. Joseph Biden (D-DE), the resolution contains a number of findings, including:
According to the American Cancer Society, 212,930 women will be diagnosed with breast cancer and 40,410 women will die from the disease in 2005;
African American women suffer a 30 percent greater mortality rate from breast cancer than white women and more than a 100 percent greater mortality rate from breast cancer than women from Hispanic, Asian, and American Indian populations;
The risk of breast cancer increases with age, with a woman at age 70 having twice as much of a chance of developing the disease as a woman at age 50;
Mammograms, when operated professionally at a certified facility, can provide safe screening and early detection of breast cancer in many women; and
Mammography is an excellent method for early detection of localized breast cancer, which has a five-year survival rate of more than 97 percent.
