The Legislature finds and declares all of the following:
(a) California has the highest incidence of and death from prostate cancer, and due to the increased public awareness of the disease, the timing is appropriate to establish programs for prostate cancer education and early detection services for uninsured men. Despite the advances in the treatment and detection of prostate cancer, the death rate of this disease continues to climb at an alarming rate--a rate higher than breast cancer and many other high profile diseases.
(b) Approximately 200,000 new cases of prostate cancer will be diagnosed this year.
(c) Prostate cancer is the most common cancer in men.
(d) Prostate cancer has led to an estimated 38,000 deaths nationally in 1994 and is the second-leading cause of cancer death in men.
(e) Nationally, the incidence of prostate cancer increased 50 percent between 1980 and 1990.
(f) Prostate cancer diagnosis in California nearly doubled over the five-year period covered by the recently published California Cancer Registry, from 11,900 new cases in 1988 to 22,200 in 1992. The age-adjusted incidence rate increased by 65 percent, from 98.6 new cases per 100,000 males in 1988 to 163 in 1992.
(g) African Americans have a 30 percent higher risk of developing prostate cancer than whites, which is the highest risk of any race or ethnic group.
(h) About 60 percent of all prostate cancers are discovered before they have spread.
(i) The cure rate for prostate cancer, if detected before metastasis, is 84 percent.
(j) The majority of commercial managed care plans offer prostate cancer screening for their members.
(k) The employment of prostate-specific antigen assays as common medical practice within suspect categories will enhance early detection of prostate cancer.
(Added by Stats. 1998, Ch. 939, Sec. 1. Effective January 1, 1999.)