DeSoto Times-Tribune
Ashleigh Parker visits Capitol Hill to lobby for better cancer treatment access
By Mark Randall
An Olive Branch cancer survivor was on Capitol Hill this week to advocate for more funding for cancer research and greater access to clinical trials.
Ashleigh Parker, who is a colorectal cancer survivor and founder of DeSoto Hope, was part of a delegation who met with members of Mississippi’s Congressional delegation as part of the American Cancer Society Cancer Action Network during its annual leadership summit and Lobby Day.
Parker visited with Senators Cindy Hyde-Smith and Roger Wicker, and Representative Trent Kelly to urge them to support policies that increase national funding for cancer research. According to the ACS, cancer deaths have fallen by 34 percent over the last 30 years thanks to a steady and significant increase in federally funded cancer research that has led to new cancer drugs and new treatments.
The U.S. government provides $7.4 billion annually for cancer research through the National Cancer Institute. The NCI is part of the National Institutes for Health which received $47.2 billion in federal funding in 2026 which is 57.3 percent of all global cancer research funding.
She reminded lawmakers that it is crucial that they continue to fund agencies like the NIH, NCI, and the Centers for Disease Control in the fight against cancer.
“We personally met with each one of them,” Parker said. “The meetings we had, they were very receptive.”
Parker was diagnosed with Stage 4 colorectal cancer in 2019 at age 48.
Parker asked lawmakers to support the bipartisan Clinical Trial Modernization Act which would make it easier for people with cancer to participate in clinical trials, especially in rural areas and for those with limited incomes. Passage of the act would ensure more patients regardless of their geographic location or economic means have a chance to enroll in clinical trials.
“We don’t really have any clinical trials in Mississippi,” Parker said. “So we are trying to get our legislators to co-sponsor that. It helps make clinical trials more accessible to everyone and not the people who’ve the finances and the ability to travel.”
She went to UT MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston for her initial consultation.
Parker said if funding gets cut for cancer research, many of those clinical trials stop and patients have to start all over.
“That’s life or death,” Parker said. “And that makes a big difference. Thank God for the clinical trials that were done before me that set my health journey where they knew what kind of chemo to use and the radiation and surgeries that I needed. Sometimes these clinical trials change the medical plans.”
Parker said hopefully lawmakers in Mississippi will sign on to the bill that will allow more cancer patients to be able to participate in clinical trials closer to home so they won’t have to travel to medical centers in cities like Houston, Nashville, or the Mayo Clinic.
“It would cut some of that red tape so that people could be treated closer to home, which levels the field for people that have the ability to travel or not,” Parker said. “A lot of times when you travel for a procedure you’re going to have a caregiver with you, and they have to take work off. It costs a lot of money to have cancer and survive it.”
Parker said Wicker, Hyde-Smith, and Kelly all pledged to give serious consideration to supporting the proposed legislation.
“Everyone seems to be really positive about what we presented to them,” Parker said. “They said they were going to look into it.”
Parker said she is always willing to help advocate for more cancer research whenever the Cancer Action Network reaches out to her. More than 750 patients, survivors, and loved ones from all 50 states and territories traveled to Washington, D.C. to help lobby lawmakers.
“I am always going to say yes,” Parker said. “God saved me for a reason. I want everyone to have the same ability and access to fight cancer that I had. You get one first shot at punching cancer in the throat and it needs to be the best one.”
She’s hopeful that their message came across.
“We got good people that listened,” Parker said. “Hopefully they will keep listening and keep working hard for cancer patients.”