#Moonshot4Kids

After accidents and injuries, cancer is the leading cause of death in children in the United States; historically, research for pediatric cancer has  been underfunded relative to the urgency of need.  DIPG, diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma, is responsible for the majority of pediatric brain tumor deaths annually in the US, and brain cancer is the #1 cause of death in children with cancer.  DIPG exemplifies in a very terrible way the neglect of pediatric cancer research in our medical research system:  despite its deadly nature and decades of clinical awareness of the disease, there has been no change in standard treatment protocol nor the terminal prognosis for DIPG in over 50 years.  Routinely, parents discover there are no solutions for them because "the numbers aren't great enough for investors," which indicates that the size of the patient population for commercial purposes weighs more heavily in our medical research system than anything else.

 

Many parents feel that this is an unacceptable excuse for the reality they are expected to endure and accept:  they must witness the death of their child in utter helplessness not knowing exactly when, how, or ultimately why. 

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Please note: this marginalization of DIPG as a 'rare' disease is common to most cancers which are almost exclusively pediatric. Our fight to raise awareness for DIPG is our fighting cry for all children who have died from cancer, and for those struggling to stay alive now. 

As you may well imagine, most DIPG families are too devastated to take vigorous action in a concerted way to raise awareness for this injustice; when they experience it, they're told it's just too rare and they are too isolated for it to be seriously considered.  However, with the advent of social media--especially over the last several years, DIPG Awareness Groups on Facebook and many new foundations have sprung up to help combat this false sense of isolation and freakishness.  Children are dying of DIPG daily, and are being diagnosed daily. 

With awareness of one another, and working together, we are the ones who have the opportunity to expose this issue of the under-funding of ALL pediatric cancer research.  Join US!