Childhood Cancer
In life there are so many things that people will have do that are difficult. But I would say that there is very few things that could possibly be as hard as watching your child suffer though a life threatening disease, the future uncertain and the possibility for a cure just beyond our reach.
As the parent of a cancer child there is so little that we can do to help our kids, we cannot make this better, we cannot kiss this away. What we can do is raise awareness, raise much needed funds for research of childhood cancers, something that is being neglected by our national cancer groups and government.
Did you know that cancer is the #1 killer of kids?
More than AIDS, diabetes, cystic fibrosis, congenital anomalies, and asthma combined?
My daughter is one of over 40,000 kids battling cancer at this very moment.
The average age of a child being diagnosed is 6, the average age for an adult is 66.
Three out of every five children who survive cancer will be diagnosed with another cancer, a chronic illness or another life threatening illness before they are adults.
In the U.S. alone, over 3000 children die from cancer each year….there is no real statistic for how many die of the secondary effects of the treatments….infections, organ failure, respiratory failure…1 is too many.
Every four hours a child will die from pediatric cancer.
Only about 20% of adults with cancer show evidence that the disease has spread to distant sites on the body at diagnosis yet 80% of children are diagnosed with advanced disease.
In the past 25 years, only 1 new cancer drug has been approved for pediatric use.
Only 3% of the budget from the National Cancer Institute goes towards Pediatric Cancer Research.
Our government recently made huge cuts in the Childhood Cancer budget.
As a nation we spend $14 BILLION per year on the space program, but only $35 MILLION on childhood cancer. The state of Florida alone spends more annually to save the manatee than we do nationally for researching treatment options for children with cancer.
Childhood cancer can affect any child – from newborns to teenagers. There is no known cause . . . no one knows why some children get cancer . . . and no one knows why some children get better and some children don’t. There are no boundaries it won’t cross, cancer doesn’t discriminate.
And most importantly we do know that RESEARCH is the only way to find a CURE! Research is the only HOPE for the 40,000 children currently in treatment for cancer. We have to work together to find a cure . . . to stop this disease from taking more precious innocent lives.
