Congressman Dolliver just a moment ago inquired of Dr. Rusk about information, and this particular bill of mine I would like to read it— has one section there under the functions which provides for the establishment of an information center and research center, for the diagnosis, treatment, and preventment of heart diseases, and which information center is to collect and to make available through publications and other appropriate means information as to the application of research and other activities carried on pursuant to this act.

Mr. DOLLIVER. Thank you very much, Mr. Congressman, for calling my attention to that.

Mr. SMATHERS. So I would also at this time-I know that you gentlemen are already saturated with the facts concerning heart diseases, so rather than real all of this to you, I would like to submit, if it has not already been submitted, this statement of facts as to the number of sufferers from heart diseases; what kind of people suffer from heart diseases; how many doctors we have who are specialists; how much money is spent today in the investigation, research, and prevention of heart diseases. I would like to introduce that and say that that information was compiled at the instigation of Mr. Albert D. Lasker, of the National Heart Committee. I also would like to introduce a list, and read to you gentlemen briefly, some of the names of the members of the National Heart Committee. I understand that has not yet been done. This is just to indicate to you the type, kind, and number of people who are very vitally interested in this most important legislation. We have here just a few, you have heard of them before.

Herbert Bayard Swope, New York, publicist and journalist
Gardner Cowles, publisher of Look magazine

Elmo Roper, public-opinion expert

Samuel Goldwyn, motion-picture producer and president of
Samuel Goldwyn Productions

Grantland Rice, syndicated sports columnist

Philip Murray, president CIO

James A. Farley, chairman of the board, Coca-Cola Export Co.
William Green, president, American Federation of Labor
Dr. Harry Emerson Fosdick, Protestant church leader, minister
emeritus, Riverside Church, New York

John Hay Whitney, president, J. H. Whitney Co., New York
Lowell Thomas, syndicated news commentator

Governor James Cox, of the Democratic Party, former can-
didate for President

Mrs. Daniel Mahoney, who is here today, Miami Daily News,
Miami, Fla.

Mrs. Bernard Gimbel, New York, N. Y.

Henry Luce, editor of Time and Life.

And I could go on reading to you as it includes just about everybody who has attained success in his particular line and represents the particular activity and different type of business. They are interested in this legislation and they are anxious to see this Congress adopt some legislation which will do something to stop this disease.

I have a prepared statement here which I shall not read, except in part, if it is agreeable with the committee.

As I say, I know you are already well saturated with these facts and with the arguments, but I do want to read you just some of the statistics in the event some of you might have missed a few of them. The statistics show, of course, that the various forms of heart disease are not the property of the aged and infirm alone, but that actually heart disease kills more people in all walks of life than does any other four diseases combined.

One out of every three deaths now occurs because of diseases of the heart or circulatory system. It is estimated that 60,000,000 people now living in the United States will die of these diseases unless new treatments and cures can be found. In the year 1946 over one-half million Americans died of these diseases, and I have heard somebody estimate, just the other day, that by 1970 more than 3 million Americans will be so incapacitated by these diseases that they will be bedridden. This will mean that there will be 2,600,000 more people needing care in a nursing home or in an institution than there are institutional beds available for all types of sickness in the United States today.

Now, these diseases, as we said a moment ago, do not confine themselves to any age group. Heart disease is the greatest killer of children there is today. The two most prevalent forms, of course, are congenital heart disease, and then rheumatic fever.

Rheumatic fever causes about one-third the total number of cases of heart diseases that there are.

In New York City in the 10-year period from 1930 to 1940 there were 693 deaths from infantile paralysis, but in the single year 1938 there were in New York City over 1,100 deaths from rheumatic fever alone. In other words, the mortality from rheumatic fever in a single year was almost double that due to infantile paralysis in a whole decade. More children between the ages of 5 and 15 years die from rheumatic fever than from any other disease.

The most prevalent forms of heart disease in adults are high blood pressure, hardening of the arteries, and rheumatic heart disease. I know everyone here today knows someone, some friend, probably someone from his family, who has been stricken down at what he felt was the prime of life, without any explanation, without knowing why, but we know somehow that dread disease slipped up on them and away they went.

The question is, Can anything be done about it? Of course, as has been testified here by Dr. Rusk and all of the other witnesses, we think that something can be done about it. We think by the establishment of a National Heart Institute, by the appropriation of money, by the taking of these smartest young men in our country and putting them into this field of research, something can be done in order to prevent this disease, and certainly ways and means can be found to rehabilitate and cure the disease once it has happened.

Now, we know that if war came and if we were in a war and there was one particular thing which was killing one out of every three of our citizens or one out of every three of our soldiers, that certainly this Congress would not be stinting in any manner or any measure in appropriating money or setting up some methods or means of combating that enemy. Certainly in this case where we have a disease which is killing one out of every three people, it behooves this Congress to get busy and do something to combat that killing, because it is just as deadly a killer as is war.

As a matter of fact we know from the statistics that during the war more people were killed from heart diseases, or from diseases of the circulatory system than were killed or injured during the war.

So

if we can make that kind of an appropriation, if we can make that kind of a defense to a foreign enemy, certainly we should make some vigorous effort or some similar effort or some similar appropriation or exercise some similar ingenuity in order to combat this disease here at home.

Gentlemen, I just want to submit this statement. I will not go any further into it with you. I am confident that, as I said a moment ago, that we Congressmen can work out a bill that will be satisfactory to all of us and the National Heart Committee and the Public Health Service also, and it is most important as you gentlemen know to get on about this.

I heard the question asked, "Well, we have laws today which take care of this." But, actually, that is not the case. We have laws which are broad enough that probably some heart research could be studied or could be made under existing authority, but with a matter as important as this one is, as dangerous as heart diseases are, the damage that they are doing to our country, it certainly requires that that particular enemy be set up, set off to one side in a specific branch, and that a specific counterattack be set up to it.

That is the purpose of this particular legislation, to get a National Heart Institute set up and going immediately, which can have its own function and go out and publicize itself, where it is not encumbered by a lot of other things which, while important, are not as important as this.

I certainly urge this committee to act upon this matter and if at all probable to report at this session favorably a bill creating a National Heart Institute.

Mr. HALE. Mr. Smathers, what is the function of the National Heart Committee?

Mr. SMATHERS. The National Heart Committee is a voluntary committee that is just made up of citizens around the country who were interested in seeing this disease combatted. They are giving their time and their energy publicizing the facts about heart disease. They are anxious to see legislation enacted, because they are confident, just as we all are, if once it is enacted to set up a National Heart Institute, we can go a long ways toward combating the disease. They are a sort of moving force behind it. No one is getting paid anything or anything like that. It is entirely a voluntary group of good citizens. Mr. HALE. How many members are there of this committee?

Mr. SMATHERS. Well, I do not believe I can give the exact number. I am informed that there are 80 members.

Mr. HALE. It might be desirable if we could have a list of the members for the record.

Mr. SMATHERS. Yes, sir; I shall introduce that and I have the list here. It includes the executive committee also.

Mr. HALE. And have they made any publication of their own?

Mr. SMATHERS. So far as I know they have not made any official publication; no, sir.

Mr. HALE. I think the committee would like to have a list for the record.

Mr. SMATHERS. Yes, sir; we will introduce that.

Mr. PRIEST. Mr. Chairman.

Mr. HALE. Mr. Priest.

Mr. PRIEST. Mr. Smathers, I appreciate your interest in this subject. I know you have given a lot of study to it and I appreciate the statistics you have given us.

We had given to us yesterday, in the testimony, some statistics that were very interesting to me, with particular reference to life-insurance payments last year. As I recall the figures, the life-insurance companies paid out $430,000,000 on heart deaths benefits in 1947 and but a little over over $220,000,000 for cancer. At the same time the research organizations of those insurance companies were spending only $500,000 on research for heart and $200,000 on research in cancer.

Now, there is one other question I want to ask. You are familiar, I am sure, with the Science Foundation bill that passed both Houses last year and was vetoed. The bill passed the Senate yesterday without any provision for special commissions on heart and polio and one or two other special commissions that had been in the bill last year.

I wonder if, in your opinion, there would be any conflict with this heart bill and with a Science Foundation bill which might subsequently be passed, containing those special commissions.

Mr. SMATHERS. Congressman Priest, the problem of heart and diseases of the heart is so vastly more important-while all diseases are important and certainly a person who has some other disease thinks that that one is the most important-but the statistics show that heart disease kills one out of about every three people and are doing more damage to our homes and to society than any other disease. It can be combated by the best minds on heart diseases and if we can get a straight National Heart Institution, not encumbered, so to speak, by a commission with cancer and infantile paralysis, and all of the various other things and all of the other sciences and research matters that the national science bill provides. The matter of heart disease can be combated faster and better if it is separate and apart from the national science bill. That is what the whole theory is. We would like to get out from under the national science bill. We think we should be out from under it.

Mr. PRIEST. Then it is your opinion-and I might say that I share your opinion that even if we have a national science bill with a special commission to make a study or research in heart diseases that will in no way interfere with the work of this institute.

Mr. SMATHERS. Not in the least.

Mr. PRIEST. There would be no conflict of jurisdiction that would in any sense be detrimental to the research program?

Mr. SMATHERS. No.

Mr. DOLLIVER. Will the gentleman yield?

Mr. PRIEST. I will yield to the gentleman from Iowa.

Mr. DOLLIVER. I just wanted your comment as to "no duplication of effort."

Mr. PRIEST. I think there is a provision in the science bill, a rather broad provision, that would prevent duplication, even though the special commission might be in that bill.

Mr. SMATHERS. That is right. And all of the information, as the Doctor said, once it had been proven clinically correct would be dis

seminated, and if one has it then the others would get it, of course, generally for the use of the general public.

Mr. HALE. Are there any further questions? If not we thank you very much.

Mr. SMATHERS. Thank you.

(The statement and papers above referred to are as follows:)

STATEMENT OF CONGRESSMAN GEORGE SMATHERS

Mr. Chairman, first I want to thank you, and the other members of this committee, for holding hearings on the proposed legislation designed to set up, as an agency of of the Federal Government, an institute for the purpose of studying and investigating the cause, treatment, and cure of heart diseases. As you know, there are several bills before your committee, each of which would attempt to accomplish that worthwhile purpose, and I am sure that the sponsors of each bill appreciate the time this committee is giving to them.

The statistics of those suffering with heart diseases, the deaths resulting from heart diseases, the expected number of infirm from heart ailments, are so startling that their meaning and bearing on the future of American life cannot be subject to misinterpretation. Rather than go into the numerous facts and figures which have been presented concerning the perils of heart and circulatory diseases, I would like to have inserted in the printed record of these hearings a statement which concisely and briefly gives much of the pertinent data.

I would like to mention that these figures were made available to the sponsors of this legislation by Mrs. Albert D. Lasker of the National Heart Committee. As the statistics to which I have just referred will clearly show, the various forms of heart disease, far from being the sole property of the aged and infirm, impair and kill more people, in all walks of life and all age groups, than any other four diseases combined. One out of every three deaths now occurs because of diseases of the heart or circulatory system. It is estimated that 60,000,000 people now living in the United States will die of these diseases unless new treatments and cures can be found. In the year 1946 over one-half million Americans died of these diseases. I have read estimates stating that by 1970 more than 3,000,000 Americans will be so incapacited by these diseases that they will be bedridden. This will mean that there will be 2,600,000 more people needing care in a nursing home or an institution than there are institution beds available for all types of sickness in the United States today.

This dread opponent of our national health does not confine itself to the older element of our population, but is the greatest killer of children today. The two most prevalent forms of heart disease in children are congenital heart disease and rheumatic fever. Congenital heart disease is present at birth and is apparently caused by something going wrong in the prenatal development so that the structure of the heart or the blood vessels leading to the heart becomes faulty. Sometimes this results in no serious handicap, but in other cases the children may be compelled to lead a very quiet life, unable to enter into play or the normal activities of other children.

Rheumatic fever causes about one-third of the total number of cases of heart disease. In New York City in the 10-year period from 1930 to 1940 there were 693 deaths from infantile paralysis, but in the single year 1938 there were in New York City over 1,100 deaths from rheumatic fever alone. In other words, the mortality from rheumatic fever in a single year was almost double that due to infantile paralysis in a whole decade. More children between the ages of 5 and 15 years die from rheumatic fever than from any other disease.

The most prevalent forms of heart disease in adults are high blood pressure, hardening of the arteries, and rheumatic heat disease. Thee is probably no one in this room today who, through personal experience, is not familiar with one of these killers. Each of us has seen members of our family and many of our friends struck down in their youth or prime of life by this greatest of public enemies.

Can anything be done to decrease the pain, suffering, and death resulting from heart ailments? If the progress which has been made in the past few years is any indication, the answer is "Yes." Doctors now know that climate is an important factor influencing rheumatic fever. They know that in the temperate zones, where the weather is changeable, where there is cold and rain, and snow and slush, rheumatic fever occurs more frequently. They know that heredity