<p>President Trump on Wednesday signed into law a bill giving ;terminally ill patients the &#8220;right to try&#8221; treatments that have not been fully approved by the FDA.</p>
<p>&#8220;Thousands of terminally ill Americans will finally have hope, and the fighting chance, and I think it&#8217;s going to be better than a chance, that they will be cured, they will be helped, and be able to be with their families for a long time, or maybe just for a longer time,&#8221; said Trump. ;</p>
<p>Among the terminally ill patients to attend the signing ceremony was Jordan McLinn, an 8-year-old boy from Indiana who suffers from a degenerative genetic disease known as <em>Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy. </em>While recent advances have extended the life expectancy for DMD patients from the teen years into the early 30&rsquo;s, it is likely Jordan will be wheelchair-bound by his 12th birthday. ;</p>
<p>Experimental medications allowed by the <em>Right to Try Act</em> will give hope to people, like Jordan, who have no other option. Specifically, the law gives terminally ill patients access to drugs that have passed &#8220;Phase 1&#8221; of the FDA&#8217;s approval process. ;The complete approval process currently takes between 3 and 10 years. ;</p>
<p>&#8220;Right to try&#8221; legislation has long been a priority for Trump, GOP lawmakers, and Vice President Mike Pence &#8211; who signed a nearly identical law as Governor of Indiana in 2015. In his remarks at the signing ceremony, Trump referred to the bill as &ldquo;another promise to the American people&#8221; and ;thanked lawmakers Ron Johnson (R-WI), Joe Donnelly (D-IN), Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA), and Michael Burgess (R-TX) for helping push the bill through Congress.</p>
<p>&ldquo;America has always been a nation of fighters who never gave up, said Trump. &ldquo;This is very personal for me, as I proudly sign this bill, thousands of terminals ill Americans will have the help, the hope, and the fighting chance that they will be cured.&rdquo;</p>
<p> ;&#8212;</p>
<p>Lawmakers&#8217; attempts to pass &#8220;right to try&#8221; legislation in past years have been stymied by ;opponents ;who worry ;the new rule will create false hope, allow quack doctors to profit, interfere with FDA safeguards, and cause harm to patients.</p>
<p>&ldquo;FDA oversight of access to experimental treatments exists for a reason &#8211; it protects patients from potential snake oil salesmen or from experimental treatments that might do more harm than good,&rdquo; argues Rep. Frank Pallone Jr. (D-NJ).</p>
<p>The way I see it, if any medication changes my prognosis from &#8220;will die&#8221; to &#8220;might die,&#8221; sign me up.</p>
<p><strong>Editor&#8217;s note:</strong> While this is certainly a dangerous ; proposition for vulnerable patients, every person has the right to try to stay alive in the face of certain death. ;</p>