(CNN)Nadine Takai-Day's brother, Hawaii Democratic Congressman Mark Takai, was the politician in the family. She didn't expect to return to Capitol Hill after her last visit for Takai's memorial service after he succumbed to pancreatic cancer to lobby her brother's former colleagues.
But the more Takai-Day learned the dismal statistics about the disease -- pancreatic cancer is one of the deadliest forms of cancer with a five-year survival rate of just 9% -- she decided it was her turn to become an advocate.
"I found if I came I would have an impact because a lot of his colleagues are still here. They knew Mark, there's a personal touch to this," she told CNN in between visits with lawmakers on both sides of the Capitol, including those from her family's home state of Hawaii, and her current home state of Illinois.
In the current political climate cancer research may be one of the few issues that unites Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill against President Donald Trump's proposed budget cuts. Earlier this year when the Trump administration included a roughly 20% budget cut to the National Institutes for Health it was ignored by the GOP-controlled Congress and the eventual budget deal that the President signed included a $2 billion boost for the agency in the final deal for part of 2017.A former colleague of Takai's, retired Ohio Republican Rep. Steve LaTourette, also died from pancreatic cancer last year, and members from both parties told advocates visiting from all 50 states that they all had a personal connection with some form of the disease and are committed to continuing the effort to inject more federal resources into medical research.
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