DoD firefighters get free cancer screening tailored to occupational risk
S. 2745 — Federal Firefighter Cancer Detection and Prevention Act of 2025 · Filed by Elissa Slotkin (D-MI) · 3 cosponsors · Introduced Sep 9, 2025 · Referred to committee
Your members of Congress
Enter a ZIP to see where your representative and both senators stood on this bill.
Looked up on this device — your ZIP is never stored on our servers.
What it does
This bill requires the Department of Defense to provide free cancer screening and prevention services to all DoD firefighters during their annual health assessments. Female firefighters get mammograms (twice yearly ages 40–49, annually at 50+); all firefighters 45+ get colon cancer screening; male firefighters 50+ (or 40+ if high-risk) get prostate screening; and any firefighter can receive screening for other cancers the CDC identifies as elevated in the firefighter population. Firefighters can opt out, and the DoD must track acceptance rates and share anonymized data with the CDC.
Why we flagged it
The bill is a straightforward public-health measure targeting a specific occupational population (DoD firefighters) with documented elevated cancer risk. It mandates preventive screening and data collection to improve health outcomes and scientific understanding of occupational cancer patterns.
What the text implies
- Establishes a precedent for occupational health screening mandates within DoD; may inform future screening requirements for other high-risk military occupations (EOD, hazmat, etc.).
- CDC data-sharing provision (subsection e(3)) creates a longitudinal occupational cancer registry that could inform broader public-health policy on firefighter cancer prevention outside DoD.
- Opt-out language (subsection c) preserves individual autonomy but may create administrative burden tracking refusals and could complicate epidemiological analysis if refusal rates are high.
- Definition of 'high-risk individual' for prostate cancer includes race (African American) as a risk factor, operationalizing race-conscious medicine in federal policy; implementation will require careful clinical and ethical oversight.
Section numbers refer to the bill text the analysis read — linked under Primary records below.
Who it affects
DoD firefighters gain access to comprehensive, free cancer screening tailored to occupational risk factors, enabling earlier detection and prevention of cancers at elevated rates in their population. The bill imposes no restrictions on citizens' rights or remedies and creates a public health benefit for a workforce with documented elevated cancer risk.
Who stands to gain
- medical imaging providers (mammography, CT colonoscopy services)
- clinical laboratories (pathology, blood testing)
- healthcare systems contracted to DoD for occupational health services
Named in the bill
Department of Defense, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), DoD firefighters, National Technology Transfer and Advancement Act of 1995 (Public Law 104–113)
Where it stands
3 cosponsors: 2 Republicans, 1 Democrats.
- Sep 9, 2025 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in Senate”
- Sep 9, 2025 — Referred to Senate Committee on Armed Services · Congress.gov: “Read twice and referred to the Committee on Armed Services”
Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.
Money around this bill
1 lobbying clients named this bill on 1 disclosure filings across 1 quarter, Jun 2026 to Jun 2026. Those filings disclosed $196,000 in lobbying spend. A filing names 87 bills on average, so that figure is what each filing reported, not a share belonging to this bill.
More lobbying clients named this bill than 0% of bills with at least one filing.
Elissa Slotkin, the sponsor, reported $43,550 in PAC receipts in the 2026 cycle.
- International Association of Fire Fighters — $196,000 on 1 filing
Lobbying Disclosure Act filings through Jul 20, 2026. A filing shows who paid to lobby on a bill it names, not what changed.
How this was measured
Analysis — Quorum's AI read the bill text published by Congress.gov (5,165 characters) on May 20, 2026. Section numbers in the findings refer to that text, linked below; transparency and hidden-provision scores are compared against the median of 16,222 analysed bills.
Status and sponsors — Congress.gov's bill record — actions, committee referrals and cosponsors — loaded nightly. The timeline shows status changes, not every procedural action.
Money — Senate Lobbying Disclosure Act filings whose specific-issue field names this bill for quarters ending Jun 2026 to Jun 2026. A filing's amount is reported whole beside the median number of bills a filing names; it is never divided across them. PAC receipts are FEC-reported contributions to the sponsor's candidate committee in the 2026 cycle.
As of — lobbying records through Jul 20, 2026 · page rendered 2026-10-20.
“DoD firefighters get free cancer screening tailored to occupational risk” QuorumCivic. https://share.quorumcivic.app/bill/119/s2745 Report an error
The week in bills
One email, Sunday: what Congress passed, what it changed, and who paid.
One link arrives to confirm the address. It is used for this email and nothing else, and every issue carries an unsubscribe link.