When Donna May was diagnosed with cancer for the fourth time – this time with metastatic breast cancer – she did not expect the challenges she faced attempting to get the care she needs.
“They said you need to wait [for Social Security and Medicare benefits], and that’s just unfair,” said Donna. “What am I supposed to do?”
Donna, like many people living with metastatic breast cancer, is affected by the waiting periods required by law for Social Security Disability Insurance benefits and Medicare, even though she paid for them through employment taxes. As a result, even with temporary insurance coverage through her husband, she is paying $3,500 a month out of pocket for her medications.
“With the treatment that I’m on, waiting two years doesn’t work for me, so we’re paying so much,” she said.
Nobody should have to go through this, especially while navigating a metastatic breast cancer diagnosis. That’s why NBCC launched a campaign urging Congress to pass the Metastatic Breast Cancer Access to Care Act, a bill that would eliminate those waiting periods now.
Having dealt with cancer since 1998, Donna says that between the treatments and the financial toxicity that comes with waiting for benefits, this diagnosis has been the hardest to manage, which made her a stronger breast cancer advocate.
“I have been married for 33 years and have had cancer before, and I told my husband that this is the first time I actually feel like I have cancer,” Donna said. “I’ve never had to worry about payment because we’ve always had benefits, so this is the first time, when I’m advocating for access to care, that I’m advocating for myself. Now my voice has to be amplified a little bit louder.”
To Donna, getting the Metastatic Breast Cancer Access to Care Act signed into law would help improve the quality of her life.
“It would help tremendously,” she said. “We need the benefits so that I could be here… so I could be alive.”
Donna can’t wait. Congress shouldn’t wait. Take action today and urge Congress to pass this crucial legislation now.
