Kelly Hayes
First Lady Jill Biden is set to visit Tampa Bay Thursday, the White House announced this week. Then, on Friday, after a brief trip to Miami, Biden is planning on touring the Moffitt Cancer Center.
The visit comes just weeks after President Joe Biden announced the reimplementation of the “Cancer Moonshot” initiative. The initiative aims at reducing cancer deaths in the U.S.
The First Lady’s visit to Moffitt comes as the cancer center serves more than 68,000 individual patients annually. That number is expected to surpass 100,000 annually by 2026. Moffitt is Florida’s only National Cancer Institute-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center.
In announcing the reinstatement of the initiative, the Bidens also announced a call to action on cancer screening to jumpstart progress on screenings that were missed as a result of the pandemic. The goal: to help ensure Americans equitably benefit from the tools we have to prevent, detect and diagnose cancer, according to the White House.
The “Cancer Moonshot” initiative was first launched in 2016 when Joe Biden was Vice President. The initiative’s new goals include reducing the death rate from cancer by at least 50% over the next 25 years and improving the experience of people and their families living with and surviving cancer.
Over the last two decades, the age-adjusted death rate from cancer has fallen by about 25%, which means more people are surviving cancer and living longer after being diagnosed with cancer.
The First Lady will also go to the U.S. Coast Guard Air Station Miami in Opa-locka in between her Tampa visits.
