Statistics on Pediatric Cancer:
-Cancer is the number ONE killer of children by disease. It is the second leading cause of all childhood deaths exceeded only by accidents.
-One in 330 children will develop cancer before the age of 20.
-On average, 46 children are diagnosed with cancer every day in the United States.
-14,000 children will be diagnosed this year with cancer. That is the size of 2 average classrooms every single day, year after year.
-Currently there is between 30-40,000 children being treated for cancer in the US.
-Pharmaceutical companies fund over 50% of adult cancer research, butvirtually nothing for kids.
-Pediatric cancer research does not receive nearly as much funding as adult cancer research projects. Rhabdoid research dollars are scarce as most money is diverted to well-publicized adult forms of cancer.
-Each year, about 3,000 children die from cancer - more than from asthma, diabetes, cystic fibrosis, congenital anomalies, and pediatric AIDScombined.
-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 20 years only one new cancer drug has been approved for pediatric use.
-Only 3% of the budget from the National Cancer Institute goes towards Pediatric Cancer research. (That's 3% for ALL kinds of Pediatric Cancers combined!)
-The incidence of childhood cancer is increasing. The cause of this is unknown.
-Pediatric cancer funding is nominal in comparison to other more publicized diseases such as pediatric AIDS or juvenile diabetes which increases awareness each year.
-Most adult cancers result from lifestyle factors such as smoking, diet, occupation, and exposure to cancer-causing agents. The cause of most childhood cancers in unknown.
-Approximately 70% of children with cancer participate in research trials compared to only 3% of adult cancer patients. As a result, many of the advances in adult cancer treatments are due to breakthroughs in childhood cancer research.
-The government recently CUT the budget for Childhood Cancer research.
-As a nation, we spend $14 BILLION per year on the space program, but only $35 MILLION on childhood cancer research per year.
