Full Text of SR0735 93rd General Assembly
SR0735 93RD GENERAL ASSEMBLY
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SR0735 |
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LRB093 23938 CSA 54035 r |
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| SENATE RESOLUTION
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| WHEREAS, Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) is | 3 |
| an umbrella term used to describe airflow obstruction that is | 4 |
| associated mainly with emphysema and chronic bronchitis; and
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| WHEREAS, COPD affects an estimated 24 million people and | 6 |
| kills more than 112,000 people a year, but many people have not | 7 |
| yet learned about this debilitating disease; and
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| WHEREAS, Of the top five diseases that kill Americans, | 9 |
| including heart disease and cancer, all are on the decline | 10 |
| except COPD; and
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| WHEREAS, Pulmonary experts predict that by the year 2020, | 12 |
| COPD will be the third most deadly disease in the world; and
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| WHEREAS, COPD currently accounts for 1.5 million emergency | 14 |
| room visits and 8 million physician office and hospital | 15 |
| outpatient visits per year; the direct and indirect medical | 16 |
| costs of COPD to the U.S. economy are estimated to be $32.1 | 17 |
| billion per year; and
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| WHEREAS, While the Chicago area is acknowledged as the | 19 |
| epicenter of the asthma epidemic, smoking and exposure to | 20 |
| second-hand smoke and other air pollutants from smokestack | 21 |
| industries, such as coal-fired power plants, are identified as | 22 |
| primary irritants in the area; and
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| WHEREAS, Research has identified a hereditary factor to | 24 |
| COPD that manifests in families that tend to develop the | 25 |
| disease despite lack of exposure to environmental triggers; and
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| WHEREAS, Recently, the death rate of women with COPD has | 27 |
| surpassed the death rate of men with COPD; women over the age | 28 |
| of 40 are the fastest growing segment of the population |
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SR0735 |
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LRB093 23938 CSA 54035 r |
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| developing this irreversible disease, due in large part to the | 2 |
| equalization of opportunity for men and women to smoke over the | 3 |
| past several generations; and
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| WHEREAS, There is no cure for COPD; medical treatments | 5 |
| exist to address symptom relief and slow the progression of the | 6 |
| disease, and there are promising research leads on medications | 7 |
| that might be able to repair damage to lung tissue caused by | 8 |
| COPD; and
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| WHEREAS, Until there is a cure, the best approaches to | 10 |
| preventing COPD and its considerable health, societal, and | 11 |
| mortality impacts lie with education, awareness and expanded | 12 |
| delivery of detection and management protocols; therefore, be | 13 |
| it
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| RESOLVED, BY THE SENATE OF THE NINETY-THIRD GENERAL | 15 |
| ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF ILLINOIS, that we hereby declare the | 16 |
| month of November as COPD Awareness Month in Illinois.
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