The Honorable Edward M. Kennedy, Scientists Mina J. Bissell and Susan Band Horwitz, and Philanthropist Jon M. Huntsman to Receive American Cancer Society Highest Honor for Outstanding Contributions to Ca...( Society's Medal of Honor to be Awarde...),Health

Society's Medal of Honor to be Awarded on November 21

NEW YORK, Nov. 21 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The American Cancer Society -- the nation's leading voluntary health organization and largest non-governmental funder of cancer research and discovery -- will present its highest honor, the Medal of Honor, to four Americans who have made outstanding contributions to the fight against cancer. This year's winners, who will receive their awards at a ceremony during the American Cancer Society's annual meeting in New York City, are: The Honorable Edward M. Kennedy, United States Senator from Massachusetts, for Cancer Control; Mina J. Bissell, Ph.D., for Basic Research; Susan Band Horwitz, Ph.D., for Clinical Research; and Jon M. Huntsman for Cancer Philanthropy. The Medal of Honor, originally called the American Cancer Society Award, was first given in 1949.

Sen. Edward "Ted" Kennedy will be awarded the Medal of Honor for Cancer Control. Sen. Kennedy (D-Mass.) is one of the great champions in the legislative fight against cancer. Throughout his more than 40 years in the U.S. Senate, he has fought tirelessly for health care-related causes, from equal access to health care to increased funding for cancer research and early detection cancer screenings. By authoring legislation on a variety of issues, Time magazine, in a 2006 article, speculated his work has affected the lives of virtually every "man, woman and child in the country."

Sen. Kennedy has been a passionate supporter of cancer research funding from his early days in office. As chairman of the Senate's health subcommittee in 1971, he led the passage of the National Cancer Act, which is widely considered the most dramatic piece of health legislation ever enacted. Representing a concerted national campaign against cancer, the law authorized increased funding for federal cancer research; today, it enables funding of more than $4 billion per yea
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