Your Voice Can Save Lives: How State Advocacy Is Expanding Access to Prostate Cancer Screening

Saving lives from prostate cancer in your state can take only a few minutes. Let’s learn how ZERO advocates passed state bills that make PSA screening free for high-risk patients and how you can do so in your state. 

According to Pfizer’s Lance Barbour, MPH, Sr. Director, US Oncology Policy & Public Affairs, “Advocating for change at the state level is critical to improving outcomes in prostate cancer, where access to screening, timely diagnosis, and appropriate care can vary significantly by geography. State policies play a pivotal role in shaping how patients navigate the healthcare system, and thoughtful advocacy can help ensure more consistent, equitable access to care for men and families facing this disease.”

Why Your Impact is Bigger in Your State

Stories change minds, votes, and policy, especially for state lawmakers. By explaining why a bill was introduced, stories influence the votes of 81% of state lawmakers. In the last three years, ZERO advocates have helped make PSA screening free for high-risk patients in Alabama, Delaware, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Tennessee, Virginia, and Washington D.C.

You can make a bigger impact in State Advocacy because:

• It’s easier to pass a state bill - states pass 5x more bills than Congress
• One call can influence a state lawmaker, less than 50 messages influences Congress
• You’re competing with 600,000 less people for your lawmaker’s attention
• Constituents tell their story directly to their lawmaker at bill hearings and/or meetings

How ZERO Influences Lawmakers

See below graphic for all of the factors that influence a state lawmaker’s vote.

ZERO uses these tactics to influence state lawmaker’s votes (in blue):

Constituents: state residents (including you) who tell stories to change policy

Legislative Colleagues: support from lawmakers and organizations gives our bill credibility

Lobbyist: ZERO's GR staff are registered lobbyists that advocate for our bills

Prior Vote/Commitment: prior support for a cancer bill may lead lawmakers to support our bill

Media: news coverage makes lawmakers more likely to support bills their voters support

E-Mail Blast: our email campaigns contact lawmakers, making their support 20% more likely

Read on to see how these tactics were used to pass bills making PSA screening free for high-risk patients, also known as our “no-cost PSA bill” or our “state PSA for HIM bill”.

LOUISIANA

Last October, a Louisiana advocate used our email campaign to ask his State Senator, Sen. Myers, to introduce our no-cost PSA bill. For him, introducing the bill was as easy as taking a minute to click through our campaign. Lucky for us, his State Senator is a Republican member of the Insurance Committee who supported a cancer screening bill in 2024. Sen. Myers introduced SB 84 early in the session. Because Sen. Myers had enough power to pass the bill, SB 84 passed unanimously out of the Louisiana Legislature and will likely be signed into law. If you’re lucky, a few clicks can pass a bill on the first try. 

ALABAMA

Two years ago, I met with David McElhaney about an Alabama no-cost PSA bill. David had previously met with his state lawmakers about the bill, but struggled to get support from them. He identified and met with other state lawmakers who may be interested in the bill. His State Senator, Sen. Livingston introduced our bill soon after. As a prostate cancer survivor, Sen. Livingston wanted to pass the bill himself.

David and Joe Dent began speaking with the media about the bill and how our opposition stopped the bill from passing in 2025. Shining a spotlight on the bill led journalist and prostate cancer survivor Roy S. Johnson to cover the bill in depth on AL.com. Media coverage pressured lawmakers to prioritize passing this bill in 2026. Our bill was named after David and Roy, as a testament to their stories and impact.

The David "Mac" McElhaney and Roy S. Johnson Prostate Cancer Prevention Act was signed into law on March 30th and goes into effect on January 1, 2027.

MAINE

In December 2024, Paul Lewandowski and I met to plan how to ask his lawmakers to introduce a Maine no-cost PSA bill. His State Rep is the House Majority Leader, who can influence which bills are voted out of the House. I gave Paul one pagers on the bill and data on his district, and Maine's growing high-risk population. Paul pitched the bill idea to Leader Moonen in late January, and by late March, Leader Moonen confirmed he would introduce the bill, LD 1502.

Paul spent 20 hours of the next year preparing to pass the bill in the following session in 2026. Paul mapped out the districts of key decision makers. To recruit advocates in those districts, he joined the Maine Coalition to Fight Prostate Cancer. The State of Maine studied LD 1502 and found it could save lives and costs without impacting insurance premiums or the state budget. This finding led the committee and state lawmakers to pass LD 1502 into law.

LD 1502 was signed into law on April 29th and will go into effect January 1, 2027. ZERO advocates Paul Lewandowski and Larry Langmore attended LD 1502’s signing ceremony on behalf of ZERO.

TAKE ACTION NOW

June is one of the best months to meet with state lawmakers because lawmakers are more available for meetings and it’s men’s health month. 

If you’re in a state in blue (see below), please use this campaign and instruction video to ask your state lawmakers to introduce our bill making prostate cancer screening free for high-risk patients. This is the campaign that helped introduce our Louisiana bill.

If your state is in grey above, please fill out our “Share Your Story” campaign at https://zerocancer.quorum.us/campaign/shareyourstory/.

Our state campaigns are below and can be found at https://zerocancer.quorum.us/state/.

Updates on advancing state no-cost prostate cancer screening bills:

Louisiana SB 84: awaiting Governor’s signature into law

New Jersey A 1142 & S1796: hearings expected in May and June. Please email Georgia@zerocancer.org if interested in testifying in support.

Pennsylvania HB 281 & SB 447: Hearing possible in June or Fall. Please email Georgia@zerocancer.org if interested in testifying in support.

Ohio HB 33: 3 hearings occurred in 2025, no movement in 2026

South Carolina S1019: being reintroduced for passage in 2027

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Notes on Content:

• Saving lives through advocating for prostate cancer patients can take a few minutes or a few years.
• In Louisiana, it took a few minutes and a few clicks, and the bill looks likely to pass in its first session.
• In Alabama and Maine, it took multiple years, but David and Paul believe their hard work was worth it in the end, since they know their legislation will save lives.
• Studies and advocacy reports highlight that while data provides the "what," survivor stories provide the "why," leading to significant shifts in funding and screening access
• Advocacy actions are up
• We’ve made a bigger impact:
  • No-cost PSA impact
  • Secondary bill impact
  • Statewide impact
• How little it took to get passed:
  • Hours a week
  • Number of advocates and actions

Figures on Advocacy Impact:

• Stories from voters influence the votes of 81% of state lawmakers.
• If a voter calls their state lawmaker to ask for their support of a policy, the lawmaker is up to 20% more likely to support that policy. Less than 50 constituent communications can be enough to convince a congressional office to support a policy.
• State lawmakers generally receive fewer than 5–10 contacts (i.e., phone call, email, letter) on an issue while Congressional offices receive thousands of communications from constituents weekly.
• State lawmakers have 7 to 12 times less constituents than Members of Congress.
• Constituency is less: state lawmakers are closer to the people, with each member of a state House of Representatives or Assembly representing approximately 61,000 citizens and each member of Congress representing approximately 488,000 citizens (Ballotpedia, 2021; U.S. Census Bureau, 2021).
• Out of the bills introduced in 2025, 28% of bills were passed by state legislatures, while only 2.3% of bills were passed in Congress. Over 135,000 bills were introduced in the 50 state legislatures, compared to the 10,195 bills introduced in Congress last year. (FiscalNote, 2025)
• Because storytelling is impactful, lawmakers have given higher priority to diseases with more tragic stories and willing storytellers such as breast cancer
• communication from constituents, and the sentiments contained within, function as a sort of threat, signaling that if the member does not act in line with the wishes of the people, voters will replace them in either the primary or general election. As a result, following the wishes of their constituents acts as a bargain for re-election.
• “Perceptions of constituent interests are ‘systematically skewed in favor of those [constituents] active in contacting or contributing to the legislative office.’”