Did You Know?

It has been a little over a year since my Aunt Linda passed away.  It's surreal to think of how long it has been.  It feels like both yesterday and an eternity ago, all at the same time.  She died from lung cancer. 

We have a close retired friend who lost the love of his life to lung cancer.  We participated in a charity run/walk last fall to raise funds for lung cancer research.  I kept literature from that walk that I didn't want to forget.

I want to document it here, so I can always find it.  Credit for these facts go to www.lungevity.org

• Lung cancer is the #1 cancer killer in the US, accounting for ~28% of all cancer deaths.
• LESS than 4% of federal dollars spent on cancer research are spent on lung cancer research.
• Lung cancer claims ~160,000 lives per year.  It is a devastating disease that can afflict anyone, regardless of smoking history, gender, or ethnicity.
• Lung cancer kills almost twice as many women as breast cancer.  It kills more than three times as many men as prostate cancer.
• Lung cancer currently has no effective, widely used early detection test, yet if found early, it can be treated.
• The 5-year survival rate for lung cancer is currently under 15%.

 
I don't know if these statistics are still accurate, since I got the info fall of 2012.  Even so, it's a sobering thought that these were accurate at that point in time and are probably still accurate.