Political Voices: An All-Iowa Problem, Requiring All-Iowa Solutions

By: Senate Democratic Leader Janice Weiner 

Recently, my colleague, Senator Catelin Drey, rose on the Senate floor to announce she  had been diagnosed with uterine cancer. Catelin is an otherwise healthy woman in her 30s. Her  predecessor, Senator Rocky De Witt, passed away in 2025 after a lengthy fight against  pancreatic cancer. He was just 66.  

What makes cancer unique among the many issues, obstacles, and crises Iowans face  on any given day is its impartiality. Cancer isn’t restricted by any socioeconomic or  demographic factors. It doesn’t care about your education, your bank account, or your zip  code. It’s not bothered by your age, who you voted for, or what you do for work.  

Cancer is a menace that touches us all in one way or another. By now, we all know the  stats – second highest rate in the country, only growing rate. It’s an all-Iowa problem that  requires an all-Iowa solution. And it will get even worse if we fail, right now, to meet this  moment.  

Channel every person you know whom cancer has impacted as you consider how best  to tackle this crisis that has been building for decades. We can focus on three separate, but  essential, areas: prevention, treatment, and research.  

To help prevent cancer, we must address risk factors. The Legislature can take some  concrete steps to lower exposure risk going forward.  

We can better regulate the use of tanning beds in Iowa. UnityPoint Health reports that  using tanning beds before age 35 increases your risk of developing malignant melanoma by  75%. There is a bill up for consideration in the Senate that would require parental approval for  anyone under the age of 18 to use a tanning bed.  

We can work to disincentivize vaping and tobacco use, especially by young people, to  combat rising lung cancer rates.  

We can do much more with radon detection and mitigation around the state.  When it comes to treatment, we couldn’t find ourselves at a better moment in history.  Scientific advances make patient care more manageable every year. Hospitals like UIHC  employ some of the best and brightest medical minds in the world. But in order to reach every  corner of the state, from urban to rural, we need a renewed focus on bringing in and retaining  new waves of skilled nurses, doctors, and medical professionals who see our state as a  worthwhile destination to practice. We must invest in an Iowa that values education; an Iowa in  which medical students, residents, and practitioners alike want to build a future for themselves  and their families. We have to make childcare more accessible, housing more affordable, and  lower costs to make it easier to build a comfortable life in Iowa.  

Finally, we must invest in cancer research here at home. We can’t continue to rely solely  on fickle and fluctuating federal NIH grants. We have to build our own research funding  pipeline. The Holden Cancer Center is the gold standard for scientific research in Iowa, and its  work benefits the whole state. Last year, $1 million was allocated to cancer research funding.  While our researchers in Iowa City put the money to good use, it was a drop in the bucket. This  step is precarious and will require patience. The state budget is a mess and digging ourselves  out of the hole won’t happen overnight. But I think Iowans would take cancer research funding  over a corporate tax giveaway any day.  

None of this will be easy. Nothing cancer-related ever is. But we can’t continue down  this path while Iowans of every stripe suffer needlessly. Let’s make “the wave” at every  Hawkeye football game mean something concrete for our future: by taking action now, future  generations can look back with pride that Iowans rose as one to wave goodbye to cancer for  good.