Our Chicago: The American Center for Cures

Could $750 billion lead to cures for diseases such as diabetes, Alzheimer's and many forms of cancer? Lou Weisbach thinks it's possible. The Chicago businessman is the co-founder of an initiative called The American Center for Cures.

The proposal calls for raising the money, putting it in the hands of 16 separate units tasked with curing these devastating diseases and letting the experts get to work. Weisbach worked for Bill Clinton's administration.

"I met a Dr. Rick Boxer. And Rick Boxer, right now, is on the National Cancer Advisory Board. And we sat down one day, and this is 26 years ago, and said if we were really serious about ending Alzheimer's, ending Parkinson's, ending breast cancer, how would you go about it? So, we took a blank sheet of paper and we wrote down everything that we would do and we realized at the end of that exercise, that nothing that we do then or today is in place to be able to get the job done."

Legislation, at the time, went nowhere.

"But today it's changed. And what really changed things was Donald Trump, and this is counterintuitive, when he cut research spending, all of a sudden the researchers in America panicked. And they looked at our model and they said, you know what, this makes sense." Weisbach says to raise that $750 billion they're going to have a bill in Congress, "To have the Treasury sell $750 billion worth of bonds. $125 billion a year. And the financial responsibility for 125 in the first year is $6 billion in interest. 12 in the second year. So just think, to give hope to every American who has a disease, that we have a team that has everything necessary to get the job done for in the first year, $6 billion, the second year $12 billion, it's an amazing opportunity for us. And the country's at a place right now, where we've never been more divided, and here's something that everyone watching your show today has been touched by disease. And has watched people die and suffer from things that shouldn't even exist anymore. And now we've got a plan that's going to get this done." If the money and researchers are in place, Weisbach thinks cures could be found "fairly quickly." He adds, "The time has come to do everything that we can do and maximize our opportunity and I believe the American Center for Cures will get that done."



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