 (Excerpts from an article
provided by Health Plan Magazine)
How three Californians
struggled to realize their dream of a Breast Cancer
Research stamp.
After a near-fatal
car crash, doctors told this long-distance runner she would never run again.
When the diagnosis was breast cancer, they said she would never live. When
she teamed up with a surgeon and a widower to challenge the norms of the
U.S. Postal Service, they said she would never win. They were wrong.
One day
two years ago, Betsy Mullen woke up in her Washington hotel room to do
what she had done the day before and the day before and what she had been
dreaming about the night before. Flinging her feet over the side of the
bed, she prepared that day to take countless steps up and down the cool,
hard floors of the U.S. Capitol, from office to office, knocking on every
door, and speaking to anyone who would listen. People told her it would
take nothing short of an act of God to convince Congress to pass a type
of bill that, before her arrival, would never have been considered.
That day,
Mullen's legs buckled, and the breast cancer survivor of three and a half
years feared the worst: that the disease had metastasized to her bones.
On wobbly legs, she left her room to pound the unforgiving, marble floors
of the Capitol. She had witnessed acts of God before and was determined
to see at least one more.
Bodai called
on Betsy Mullen to join him in his Washington campaign. Doctors diagnosed
Mullen with breast cancer in 1992 at age 33. A market research analyst,
she abandoned her career to form the Women's Information Network Against
Breast Cancer (WIN ABC), which provides information and support for life-and-death
decisions about treatment options. When WIN Board Member David Goodman,
who had lost his wife to breast cancer less than a year before, learned
about the lobbying effort, he called Bodai and volunteered for service.
The team - a survivor, a surgeon, and a widower - proved hard to refuse.
Congressional doors started to open, and overworked legislative aides took
time to listen.
On the night of July 22, 1997, high in the bleachers
above the House of Representatives, Bodai, Mullen, and Goodman breathlessly
awaited the vote. Fazio abandoned his seat on the floor and made his way
up the long staircase to sit with the team. "It was surreal watching it
happen," Mullen says of the 433 to 3 vote in favor of the bill. "We had
our hearts in our mouths. We were witnessing history. But we still had
to face the Senate."
There, with some last-hour damage control following compelling remarks
from opponents, Feinstein lobbied to win support for the bill which, at
last, was passed and signed into law by President Clinton on Aug. 13, 1997.
"They [Bodai, Mullen, and Goodman] and the many others who tirelessly walked
the halls of Congress to fight for this stamp deserve our enormous thanks,"
Feinstein says.
Never giving up their crusade, the group set out to promote awareness of
the stamp any way they could.
"The success of this effort
demonstrates that the
American dream of participatory democracy
is still alive."
Don Parsons, MD
The Permanente Federation
News
from Dianne Feinstein, Chronicle of Philanthropy Article
Information provided
by HealthPlan Magazine, Sept/Oct 1998.
"True Grit:
Stamping Out Breast
Cancer" was written by Genevieve Belfiglio.
Last Updated:
06/01/2004
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