Childhood Cancer Awareness

Here is a quiz for you. . . October is ________ Cancer Awareness Month. To show your support you wear what color on Fridays?

I’ll bet that every adult and child in the U.S. would be able to provide the correct answers. October is Breast Cancer Awareness month. Pink is the color to wear on Fridays to show your support.

My aunt had breast cancer several years ago. I fully support any and all efforts to eliminate breast cancer from the lives of women. It is a terrible disease that has cut the lives of many adult women too short. It has prematurely taken daughters, wives, mothers, aunts and grandmothers from their families.

Quiz #2: September is _________Cancer Awareness. To show your support you wear what color?

September is Childhood Cancer Awareness month. You are supposed to wear yellow/gold to show your support. Did you know that cancer is the number one killer disease in our children?

My parents knew when I was born that she was special. Little did I know that I would be ‘the one.’

I was ‘the one’ in 300 children who will be diagnosed with cancer before the age of 20. I was ‘the one’ in the 1.1 million children to be diagnosed with Wilm's Tumor. I was one of the 40,000 children who had to fight cancer.

My parents were forced to wonder if I be one of the 3000 children who die from cancer.

Cancer, whether you are an adult or a child is devastating. It is certainly not my attempt to minimize any cancer or to prioritize any life. Life is precious. But my problem is just that-- ALL life is precious. And if ALL life is precious, why is there minimal funding and virtually no recognition for childhood cancer and research?

When I talk about childhood cancer, I can put faces to names. Want a list? I can give you twenty kiddos off the top of my head who are battling cancer. I can see little faces, skinny bodies and bald heads. I can give you at least a dozen more names of children who have earned their wings in the past year.

Here is food for thought. The National Cancer Institute (NCI) is responsible for the federal funding for childhood cancer. Funds are distributed to investigators at children’s hospitals, to the Children’s Oncology Group and to labs in the NCI to fund research.

Congress is responsible for coming up with a budget to fund the research. Cancer research is budgeted at 5.6 billion dollars for 2009. Sounds like a lot doesn’t it? Of that breast cancer received 12%, prostate cancer received 7% and all 12 major groups of pediatric cancers combined received less that 3%.

To put this into perspective NCI allotted 572.4 million dollars for breast cancer research in 2007. Other NIH institutes funded breast cancer research at 132.6 million and the Dept of Defense allocated 138 million dollars. That is over 800 million dollars in funding. That does not take into account funds raised through campaigns and donations which totaled over 250 million dollars. (info pulled from Candlelighters.org)

So with my limited math ability, 572+132+138+250 = well. . . something like $1 billion dollars for breast cancer research.

In 2007, the NCI reported that the combined extramural and intramural funding for childhood cancer research was approximately $180 million. However, this estimate could be regarded as liberal as some of the associated research might not be perceived as directly benefiting childhood cancer. Other more conservative estimates, put childhood cancer research funding as low as $30 million annually. (cited from Candlelighters.org)

Breast Cancer research = $1 billion dollars

Childhood Cancer research = somewhere between $30 million and $180 million.

THE BOTTOM LINE: Money drives research and research drives survival rates.

My bottom line as a childhood cancer survivor is--

I am thankful that I lived through it!.

I want my fight to matter to someone.

I want my struggle as a survivor to matter to someone.

I want someone to take notice and help these kids I take care of everyday.

I want my community and your community to start supporting research in this area.

Pink in October is wonderful! It is necessary but I want to see yellow in September.
I want to hear that ‘real men wear yellow’.
I want my yogurt container to have a yellow lid.
I want the students in my school district to wear hats on Fridays and donate the money to help fund childhood cancer research. I want celebrities like Ellen to sell yellow shirts in September to promote the cause.
I want to see professional sports teams sporting yellow in September.
I want to have the option to buy a yellow ‘childhood cancer’ magnetic ribbon at my local pharmacy to plaster on my vehicle.

There are things that can be done. . . I am just one person. I need the rest of you to find something that you can do in your community to make a difference in the lives of children. Many of you have your own children. . . imagine if cancer invaded your life. . . imagine if there was a cure out there but no money to find it.

Had this issue been addressed years ago, maybe, just maybe the cancer unit at our hospital wouldn't have a waiting list. Unfortunately so many kiddos are running out of options. Few options mean little hope in their fight against cancer.

Again: Money drives research which drives increase survival rates. . .

Continue to wear your pink and send in your yogurt label, but please help me and the millions of kids fighting cancer by taking some kind of action to support research and funding of childhood cancer.

(Written/Adapted with permission of Katie Clayton, mother of a child with cancer)