Texas Taxpayers to Give Cancer Research Another $3 Billion

Voters approved a measure to double the state’s Cancer Prevention & Research Institute of Texas.

Kerry Grens

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The Cancer Prevention & Research Institute of Texas, a state-run program with a $3 billion budget, will receive another $3 billion after voters approved a ballot measure on Tuesday (November 5), Science reports. The influx of funds means that CPRIT will receive $300 million a year for the next 10 years.

“Everyone at CPRIT appreciates the confidence Texans place in us to guide the state toward a cancer-free future,” CPRIT CEO Wayne Roberts says in a statement.

The agency began in 2009 with the goal of fueling science, bringing in top talent, developing new therapeutics, and encouraging cancer prevention. CPRIT encountered scandal in its early years when an audit discovered that $56 million in grants had been awarded without proper review, while other applications were left in limbo. This led officials to suspend the agency for 10 months beginning in December 2012 and overhaul is procedures ...

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Meet the Author

Kerry Grens
Kerry served as The Scientist’s news director until 2021. Before joining The Scientist in 2013, she was a stringer for Reuters Health, the senior health and science reporter at WHYY in Philadelphia, and the health and science reporter at New Hampshire Public Radio. Kerry got her start in journalism as a AAAS Mass Media fellow at KUNC in Colorado. She has a master’s in biological sciences from Stanford University and a biology degree from Loyola University Chicago.
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