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A SERVICE OF OHIO'S PUBLIC BROADCASTING STATIONS
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Wyden, who previously served in the U.S. House of Representatives for 15 years, serves on the following Committees: Budget; Finance; Select Intelligence; Energy and Natural Resources and the Special Committee on Aging. In addition, he serves on the Subcommittee on Forests and Public Land Management, Subcommittee on Water and Power and Subcommittee on National Parks.
Since his days as co-director of the Oregon Gray Panthers, Wyden has been a respected voice on health care. In 2003, he authored the bipartisan Health Care That Works for All Americans law, which walks people through the tough choices of health care and reforms the system through public input and political accountability, and the first law to protect seniors from unscrupulous Medicare insurance scams.
Wyden also exposed the tobacco companies for hiding the addictiveness of nicotine. His bipartisan legislation reformed the community health center law to make vital health services available to thousands of poor families at no additional cost to taxpayers, and increased Medicare reimbursement to states. To help women fighting cancer, he exposed and eliminated waste in the case of the Pacific yew, a so-called "trash tree" that became the original source of the breakthrough pharmaceutical Taxol.
Wyden attended the University of California at Santa Barbara on a basketball scholarship before receiving his B.A. with distinction from Stanford University. He received a J.D. degree from the University of Oregon School of Law and taught gerontology at several Oregon universities.
April 17, 2006