[Congressional Record Volume 158, Number 101 (Monday, July 9, 2012)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1208]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




  10TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE NIH RELEASE OF THE WOMEN'S HEALTH INITIATIVE

                                  _____
                                 

                        HON. CAROLYN B. MALONEY

                              of new york

                    in the house of representatives

                          Monday, July 9, 2012

  Mrs. MALONEY. Mr. Speaker, ten years ago today, on July 9, 2002, the 
National Institutes of Health released groundbreaking research findings 
from the Women's Health Initiative--the largest preventive women's 
health study ever conducted in the United States. The researchers found 
that the hormone therapy regimen women were using at and after 
menopause increased a woman's risk of heart disease, rather than 
decreasing it, as many had believed, and that it also increased her 
risk of getting breast cancer.
  For decades before this, hormone therapy had been heavily marketed 
and routinely prescribed to women during menopause, making it one of 
the most prescribed drug regimens in the country with more than 90 
million annual prescriptions written in 1999. But after learning about 
these research findings, women voted with their feet and hormone 
therapy prescriptions dropped quickly. This was followed by the first 
significant drop in breast cancer rates in United States history--there 
are 160,000 women who were not diagnosed with breast cancer over the 
last 10 years because they avoided unnecessary exposure to drugs that 
would have caused it.
  Many people deserve credit for this remarkable public health 
achievement--the researchers at the National Institutes of Health who 
led the effort, including the late Dr. Bernadine Healy, the first 
female director of NIH, who spearheaded the launch of the WHI; the 
women who volunteered to enroll in the WHI as research subjects to 
advance science for the benefit of all women; women's health advocates 
like the National Women's Health Network which built public support and 
demand for research into the pressing health issues of concern to 
women; and the women in Congress who led the charge in 1991 to increase 
the nation's investment in women's health research.
  The Women's Health Initiative involved more than 27,000 post-
menopausal women at 45 clinical centers across the nation. It remains 
unsurpassed as the largest women's health research study of women in 
this age group. Despite this historic significance, however, 
unfortunately women are still underrepresented today in health 
research. For example, women make up just 34 percent of heart disease 
prevention trials and less than 40 percent of clinical cancer research. 
I rise today to call on my colleagues to support a more equitable 
allocation of resources and to address the vital need for more 
investment in research on women's health.

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