..:.: Battle 4 a Cure:.:..

•	Childhood cancers are the #1 disease killer of children - more than asthma, cystic fibrosis, diabetes, and pediatric AIDS combined.
•	Every year approximately 12,500 children and adolescents under the age of 20 are diagnosed with cancer and about 4,000 of children die from cancer each year. That means about 11 children die from cancer or cancer-related complications each day.
•	Attempts to detect childhood cancers at an earlier stage, when the disease would react more favorably to treatment, have largely failed. Young patients often have a more advanced stage of cancer when first diagnosed. (Approximately 20% of adults with cancer show evidence the disease has spread, yet almost 80% of children show that the cancer has spread to distant sites at the time of diagnosis).
•	Funding for pediatric cancer clinical trials has gone down every year since 2003.
•	In 2006, the National Cancer Institute's (NCI) federal budget was $4.6 billion. Of that, breast cancer received 12%, prostate cancer received 7%, and all 12 major groups of pediatric cancers combined received less than 3%. And childhood cancer research only gets 2.96% of the money raised by the American Cancer Society.
•	In dollar terms, NCI’s funding for pediatric clinical trials is $26.4 million while funding for AIDS research is $254 million, and breast cancer is $584 million.
•	Every school day 46 young people or two classrooms of students are diagnosed with cancer in this country and more than 40,000 young people are currently in treatment.
•	Once considered nearly incurable, through research, 78% of patients overall survive today. Despite this amazing progress, cancer still claims the lives of one in four infants, children, and young adults diagnosed.
•	One in every 330 Americans will develop cancer by the age of 20.
•	On the average, 1 in every 4 elementary school has a child with cancer. The average high school has two students who are a current or former cancer patient.
•	Childhood leukemia (making up the largest group of childhood cancers) was once a certain death sentence, but now can be cured almost 80% of the time.
•	The cause of most childhood cancers are unknown and at present, cannot be prevented. (Most adult cancers result from lifestyle factors such as smoking, diet, occupation, and other exposure to cancer-causing agents).