Noted

Congress approved a federal budget for fiscal year 2018 that will include a $3 billion increase for the NIH, bringing the agency's budget to $37.1 billion. The NCI will receive $5.965 billion, including $300 million designated for the National Cancer Moonshot Initiative through the 21st Century Cures Act. The FDA's Oncology Center of Excellence will receive $15 million.

Gynecologic cancer research is disproportionately underfunded. In an analysis of funding for 13 common cancers presented at the Society of Gynecologic Oncology Annual Meeting on Women's Cancer in New Orleans, LA, ovarian, cervical, and uterine cancers ranked 9th, 10th, and 12th, respectively. Ovarian cancer had a mean expenditure of $85,000 per year of life lost per 100 new cases, compared with a mean of $1.81 million for prostate cancer.

The American Association for Cancer Research (AACR) launched the “2020 by 2020” initiative to improve understanding of cancer outcomes for African-Americans. The initiative aims, by 2020, to combine genetic sequencing data from tumor and normal tissue samples from 2,020 African-American patients with their clinical records.

Chlamydia is associated with increased risk of ovarian cancer, according to findings presented during a media preview for the AACR Annual Meeting 2018. Researchers established that women who had antibodies against the protein pgp3, which is a highly accurate marker for chlamydia, were twice as likely to have been diagnosed with ovarian cancer as those lacking the antibodies.

Several public health organizations are suing the FDA for delaying regulation of electronic cigarettes (e-cigarettes) and cigars. The lawsuit challenges the agency's decision to extend the deadline for manufacturers to submit product-review applications to the FDA from August 2018 to August 2021 for cigars and August 2022 for e-cigarettes.

The University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center received a $150 million gift from Richard and Susan Rogel. The money will support cancer research through various avenues including grants, endowed professorships, and scholarship assistance for scientists-in-training.

For more news on cancer research, visit Cancer Discovery online at http://cancerdiscovery.aacrjournals.org/CDNews.