Where Cancer Patients Rank

[nosmokes]

original-progressivepopulist


Sam Uretsky

Where Cancer Patients Rank

The Breast Cancer Awareness Stamp is a semi-postal -- now do the math.

Semi-postals are a feel-good device. You buy a stamp for 43¢. The Postal Service takes its 41¢ for postage, plus some percentage for reasonable costs, and gives the rest to the specified charity. In the case of Breast Cancer Awareness, 70% of the net amount raised is given to the National Institutes of Health and 30% is given to the Medical Research Program at the Department of Defense. According to the New England Journal of Medicine, the NIH budget is about $28.6 billion for fiscal year 2007, a 0.1% decrease from 2006,or a 3.8% decrease after adjustment for inflation -- the first true budgeted reduction in NIH support since 1970. The less we spend on biomedical research, the more money we have for blowing people up.
~snip~
.
.
.
complete article here