A while back I had posted a story about my brother who battled Osteosarcoma from age 16-19. He was on his way to becoming an amazing man when his life and our life as a family came to a unexpected turn down a aweful road of ups and downs through chemo, radiation, remission to his untimely death and I would never wish that upon anyone. I miss him everyday.
Well for obvious reasons, Childhood Cancer Sucks! But now it is the #1 cause of death in the US! Being a parent that is frightening to hear. Do you want to know the statistics? 13,500 new diagnoses each year, That means that 1 in 300 boys will get cancer or 1 in 333 girls will be diagnosed before their 20th birthday. I have linked to 2 articles about this topic and although I can see a little biased point of view from the source I side with this article. Plain and simple her last statement in the article "Cancer rates have risen to epidemic levels if estimates now show one in two adults will get cancer sometime in their lifetime. With childhood cancer as the number one child cause of death, what kind of cancer odds will our children face in their future? Forget racing for the cure; we have to start focusing on the cause!"
- See more at: http://eatlocalgrown.com/
The other article that references this information: http://abcnews.go.com/Health/conquering-childhood-cancer/story?id=20348929
While I love that ABC News had a story to raise awareness in September for Childhood Cancers. They missed the point. Notice in the article how optimistic getting cancer is.. Yes we now have a 84 percent chance of surviving... and then go on to talk about all the drug and protocols that are available... I should say we have an 84% chance of surviving the most popular childhood cancer. I know that rate is not as optimistic for more "rare" cancers such as sarcomas.. While never once touching on the most crucial factor.. Prevention!
So what are we doing to prevent ourselves and our children from getting cancer?
We need to identify the most possible causes in our own lives and get rid of them or try to reduce exposure. If we are surrounded by thousands of things that are "possible carcinogens" don't you think all those things will add up? Thousands of products have been tested and have passed only based off their own exposure.
We need to educate ourselves on what are possible carcinogens and make a list of everything we eat and use and start living as carcinogen free as we can control. Because we cannot control the world, or our government by any measure.
If we want our children to have a future, we need to make some changes.
I will try to publish my list soon on what exposure our family has and what we plan to do to limit that exposure.
Thanks for reading, my only hope in publishing this post is to help raise awareness of this topic. I hope to save a child's life somewhere somehow. I know that this can be a controversial topic, I am not pointing fingers or trying to give anyone a bad name. |
| Our Childhood Cancer Awareness Flag |
