Did You Know? Medical Technologies Depend on Minerals and Metals

As February marks National American Heart Month, we’d like to highlight minerals’ contributions to the life-saving medical devices and medications that doctors and patients rely on every day. While many are not aware of this fact, minerals and metals are essential to the technologies that define our modern medical world and are key to many of the medicinal innovations we see today.

In fact, gold is essential to sophisticated medical equipment, including life-supporting devices, pacemakers and heart stents, and it is used in the treatment of heart disease.  Likewise, silver and gold are crucial materials to operate CAT scan devices, and lithium is widely utilized in pacemakers, defibrillator machines and other types of portable electronic equipment.

While all of these life-saving minerals can be mined right here in the United States, our redundant and duplicative permitting policy prevents full access to these critical minerals. In order to stimulate and advance the innovations that make better health and medical treatments, our legislators must take action on this pressing issue. While the House of Representatives passed Rep. Mark Amodei’s (R-Nev.) “National Strategic and Critical Minerals Production Act of 2013,” it’s time for the Senate to take meaningful action on reworking this outdated regulatory process.

Are you with us? Take action here.