The Cancer Room

We've done all we can?

When I worked in law enforcement there was no crime as important as the one where a child was the victim. If children were abused, abducted, or killed, every member of the department was involved in the identifying, searching for, and catching the bad guy. A kid goes missing and everything stops. That is just the way things are.

The justice system, for what's it worth, makes children a priority. People who hurt children are the ones who get the longest sentences. Special laws are created just for them so we can keep them away from kids. You don't hurt a child and get away with it.

Hell, even in prison the rules are the same. Prisoners who were convicted of hurting children are not safe from other prisoners. Even there they understand that kids are a priority and you don't mess with them.

In the world of cancer research, however, things are not like in the rest of the world. Kids are not the priority. There is not an urgent desire to find better treatments for cancers that affect mostly children. Yes, there is a lot of overlap in cancers and there is research being done in a variety of cancers that affect kids. But the cancers that affect mostly children almost never break the top 50 percent of research grants in any given year. Breast cancer research (one of the earliest detectable and preventable cancers) has more than double the money and grants of all combined cancers that affect mostly children in this past year alone.

Don't get me wrong. All cancers are ugly. But coming from a family whose has had experience with childhood cancer 20+ years ago and again this year it's hard not to notice that the treatments are the same. In all cancers you are either cutting, burning, or poisoning the patient to make them better. Do you understand that? You are cutting, burning, or poisoning children to make them better. Try watching your child go through that and maybe you will understand why things are not moving fast enough.

In this month alone many kids whose names I know have died of cancer. Kids who have been in hospital rooms next to my grandson Andre have died of the same disease he has. It hits close to home to hear that young lives are taken by this disease. They aren't statistics in a book. I've seen these kids in hospital play rooms. I've seen them with Andre.

Yes, we see kids beat the disease. Many have "rung the bell" and have been declared cancer free. But way too many parents are being told "we have done all we can" this month. Too many kids who have not begun to live their life never will because of cancer. Considering where childhood cancers rank in importance to the research community I can't help but think that "we have done all we can" is not true. We haven't done all we can. We need to do more.

Today you will see that all the ribbons and shirts have gone from yellow and gold to pink. But if you look carefully you will also see that on this first day of Breast Cancer Awareness there will be a million more ribbons and shirts in pink than you saw the entire month of September in yellow and gold. It's not just the colors that change. Breast cancer is where the money is. That has been true for quite some time.

I know, I know, it's not a race or a competition. We should all fight together to get rid of all cancers in our lifetime. Yeah, that makes sense. Unless, of course, you're a parent of a five year old and the doctor just walked out of the room after telling you "we've done all we can". Then it makes no sense at all.

So, "cancer research", take a tip from law enforcement. Get your head out of your ass. Go after the child predators first. Don't worry about the colors. Your kids are dying.