Cancer is a terrible disease that afflicts millions of Americans every year. Fortunately, modern technology has helped stymie the disease from ruining everything in its path.

Thanks to major advances in treatment options for many cancers, survival rates have dramatically increased over the past three decades. In fact, the five-year relative survival rate for all cancers is now 67 percent.

However, pancreatic cancer has not seen the same advances. It is an insidious disease that kills 74 percent of its victims within one year of being diagnosed and only six percent survive more than five years. Worse yet, the estimated number of cases of pancreatic cancer are expected to increase by 55 percent between 2010 and 2030. Pancreatic cancer needs to be addressed so that these estimates do not turn into reality.

Legislation, called the Pancreatic Cancer Research & Education Act (S. 362/H.R. 733), is currently being debated in Congress and would require the National Cancer Institute (NCI) to develop a long term and comprehensive strategy concerning pancreatic cancer. But the bill needs your support in order to become law.

Please join me and contact Sens. Patty Murray and Maria Cantwell and Congressman Dave Reichert. Ask them to pass the Pancreatic Cancer Research & Education Act and together we can ensure that this deadly disease gets the attention that it deserves. Go to www.knowitfightitendit.org to learn how you can take action today.

– Julie K. Pember