Critical Timing Contact Congress Today To Improve Dementia Tomorrow!

Critical Timing Contact Congress Today

To Improve Dementia Tomorrow!

If you sent a message last week asking your members of Congress to stop the sequester, thank you! Today, we are hoping you — members of the ActivistsAgainstAlzheimer’s Network — will call your members of Congress directly. As we discussed last week, the looming sequestration will be devastating to scientific research, including Alzheimer’s research. It’s critical that members of Congress hear from you and other constituents. We are hoping to flood their phone lines today.

Some of you are in a unique position: Your lawmakers are part of a small group of Congressional leaders who will play an over-sized role in the decision about the proposed cuts to biomedical research funding. However, ALL members of Congress need to hear from constituents.

A call should take just a few minutes. Here are the easy steps to follow:

1) Find your state and lawmaker on the list below. If your state is not listed then find your members of Congress here: http://www.contactingthecongress.org/

· Alabama: Sen. Shelby

· California: Rep. Pelosi

· Connecticut: Rep. DeLauro

· Georgia: Rep. Kingston

· Illinois: Sen. Durbin

· Kentucky: Sen. McConnell, Rep. Rogers

· Maryland: Sen. Mikulski, Rep. Hoyer

· Nevada: Sen. Reid

· New York: Rep. Lowey

· Ohio: Speaker Boehner

· Texas: Sen. Cornyn

2) Call the Congressional switchboard at 1-202-224-3121 and ask to be connected to your member of Congress. (Or call directly if you use link above.)

3) When a staff person answers, ask to speak to the Health Legislative Assistant. (It may take a couple of minutes to connect to the right person.) Tell them you are a constituent, briefly explain how Alzheimer’s has impacted your life or others in your life, and tell them you are opposed to Congress allowing across-the-board spending cuts without regard to their impact on biomedical research.

4) Most calls will end there, but if you want to add more, share your personal experience with Alzheimer’s or use these key points:

· Alzheimer’s and other dementias place an overwhelming burden on caregivers and on the nation’s health system, costing us $200 billion this year alone, $140 billion of which is borne by Medicare and Medicaid.

· The overall costs will grow to $1 trillion annually in the future, so stopping Alzheimer’s now through innovative research will literally save trillions of dollars down the road.

· Sequestration would reduce funding for the National Institutes of Health by more than $2 billion, even though the NIH provides the foundation for private sector medical innovation.

· Alzheimer’s disease slowly steals one’s intellect, ability to communicate, independence, dignity, and even control over basic bodily functions like eating ad personal hygiene.

5) If you can, please let me know that you’ve made the call so we can track how many people called.

6) Please share this email with family and friends and ask them to take a few minutes to call!