Transcript of Sen. Bill Frist's Convention Speech

Aug. 3 -- Tennessee Sen. Bill Frist, a respected doctor, spoke to the Republican National Convention about the nation’s health care system and Texas Gov. George W. Bush’s plan to fix it. Read a full transcript of his remarks here.

Sen. Bill Frist:

My friends, since America was founded, we’ve been guided by the glow of liberty’s lamp. Today’s senior citizens have long been the custodians of that lamp.

Their bravery in war, their industry in peace, and their personal sacrifice in raising their families gave us the foundation upon which to build the finest health care system in the world. Our obligation to them is not satisfied simply by maintaining a Medicare program rooted in 1960’s medicine.

The Greatest Generation and generations to come deserve MODERN health security, including affordable access to prescription drugs.

America’s health care system has undergone sweeping changes. As a heart-lung transplant surgeon, I’ve been blessed to see these changes firsthand. In 1965, when Medicare was first created, heart transplants were only a dream.

Tonight, I think of Vivian Reeves. Last year, at the age of 70, Vivian energetically trotted me from booth to booth at the National Cornbread Festival down in South Pittsburgh, Tennessee.

I transplanted Vivian’s failing heart 10 years ago. She is THRIVING today, not because of advances in surgical technique, but because of the discovery of this REMARKABLE drug—a drug that revolutionized our ability to make transplants work.

And in 1965, the word biotechnology was not even in our vocabulary. Today, researchers have mapped our entire genetic code.

They are replicating proteins in laboratories and converting them into life-saving therapies so that patients with crippling rheumatoid arthritis can escape their wheelchairs and walk once again.

Scientists are continuously arming doctors with an impressive arsenal of drugs to combat cancer, heart disease, and AIDS.