Stand Up to Cancer in your own way

Many of you may have heard that there is telethon being aired tonight on all three broadcast networks to raise funds for cancer research- Stand Up to Cancer.

You don't have to donate money to make a difference in the cancer battle. You can also exercise your rights as a voter and concerned citizen.

Next week, Dan is going to visit Senator Mikulski's office (D-MD) to encourage her support of S. 3187, The Lung Cancer Mortality Reduction Act of 2008. This bill would encourage lung cancer research, establishment of early detection screenings & create a Congressional Oversight Board to specifically target mproving survival statistics for lung cancer.

You may be able to help him during his visit.

Many people have asked us what they can do for us over the past few months. We've been thinking about how to use our blog to not only get the support we need, but also to educate others and try to make a difference in the continued fight against cancer. But we've struggled with how to let people help us, mostly because we are doing so well at the moment. And we've struggled with how to educate without coming off preachy. But we now have the opportunity to both ask for help & further cancer research at the same time.

Many of you may not know of the bleak statistics associated with lung cancer, which makes our fight that more difficult:

- Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer deaths in the US in every ethnic group... 1 in every 3 cancer deaths
- Over 160,000 Americans will die this year alone from lung cancer. It will kill more than three times as many men as prostate cancer and nearly twice as many women as breast cancer
- Most people with lung cancer are diagnosed to late that they die within the first year


- Most people attribute lung cancer to smokers. However, all patients are stigmatized whether they smoked or not
- Over 60% of new patients are former smokers or people who never smoked at all
- 15% of people who get lung cancer have never smoked, like Dan or our friend Oliver
- One in five women being diagnosed now with lung cancer have never smoked

Despite these statistics, lung cancer research receives only 5% of cancer research dollars.

We need help raising awareness about lung cancer and elevating it to the proper levels so people like Dan or maybe even someone like me will have the best chance of beating the disease. It's not a disease that affects heavy smokers. It affects non-smokers, those who quite decades ago & those who never thought they fit the definition of a smoker.

And according to the medical definition, there is no such thing as a social smoker. A non-smoker is considered someone who has smoked 100 cigarettes or less. For those of us that used to enjoy a cigarette with our beers, those smokes add up pretty quickly. I am now worried that these decisions will come back to haunt me and many people like me who weren't fully educated.

Why isn't there more focus on lung cancer? Most assume it's because people bring the disease on themselves because they smoke. That is the reaction I get 100% of the time when I tell people what type of cancer Dan has- did he smoke? Simply not true.

And why aren't more people speaking out about lung cancer? Because most people who contract the disease die within the first year. There are no survivors to hold walks & events, only the loved ones left behind after cancer rips their world apart.

So when Dan goes to the Senator's office to meet with her staff next week, I am going to give him a letter to take with him. I want her to support this legislation, and any legislation that will end cancer for everyone. I want her to know about our life and why we need to focus more research dollars on lung cancer- so Dan can be here for a long time & we can prevent others from ever having to see the things we've seen.

This is where you can help. If you're a Maryland resident & would like to write a letter for Dan to deliver to Senator Mikulski, please email me at megrodgers11@yahoo.com and I will give you the form letter and our address.

I hope we can give Dan at least 10 letters. It's a small start, but it's important to raise this issue to our lawmakers. Many of them need more education with respect to lung cancer. And you help won't cost you more than 10 minutes of your time.

For more information on S. 3187, The Lung Cancer Mortality Reduction Act of 2008 visit
the Lung Cancer Alliance at http://www.lungcanceralliance.org/Senator_Stabenow_CoSponsor_PressRelease_8_11_08.html