Three Billion Reasons to Be Excited!

One of my favorite things to do is have some coffee on a Sunday morning and watch the CBS Sunday Morning show.  Nearly every story is a feel-good piece and any others are fact-based with limited negative vibe.  It’s just a good news way to start the day.  Anyhow, there was a brief piece this morning about how much money is being spent on the current presidential political campaigns.  Since we see an ad during nearly every commercial break, it should come as no surprise that the amount spent is in the hundreds of millions of dollars.  That’s a lot of money!

Then it occurred to me.  MD Anderson Cancer Center is getting ready to spend three BILLION dollars to take aim at cancer.  That’s billion…with a “B.”  Now THAT’s a lot of money!  They could pay for several presidential campaigns!  Thank God they’re spending it against cancer!

As most of you know by now, MD Anderson has launched their Moon Shots program which targets several cancers for annihilation…including melanoma!  The goals against melanoma include those involved in research, clinical trials, and prevention.  Since my personal mission is to spread melanoma awareness, their latter goal has me very excited.  MD Anderson’s website says this regarding their goals toward prevention:

There is strong evidence that exposure to ultraviolet radiation (UVR) plays an important causal role in melanoma. Despite the declaration of UVR as a carcinogen by the World Health Organization in 2009, public health surveys have reported increasing prevalence of both sun exposure and tanning bed use among adults in the U.S., and few, if any, comprehensive preventative programs targeting children exist. Further, although recent experiences in other countries demonstrate that improved sun-safety practices and skin screening can reduce both melanoma morbidity and mortality, few, if any, comprehensive screening efforts exist in the U.S.

The melanoma moon shot effort in prevention includes plans to:

·         Expand evidence-based, age-appropriate melanoma prevention approaches throughout schools

·         Access multiple forms of media and community-based interventions to discourage or eliminate tanning behavior, increase sun protection and encourage participation in skin screening efforts

This is such exciting news.  Not only are the medical gurus of MD Anderson going to concentrate on eradicating and curing this disease, their PR folks are going to concentrate on educating this country and increasing awareness!

I join many fellow bloggers and sun-safe advocates in applauding the MD Anderson Cancer Center and offering help in any way I can.

Thank you!