Pray for the children with brain cancer - the number 1 cancer responsible for childhood deaths

'Improved treatments introduced beginning in the 1970s raised the 5-year survival rate...'

A new federal report revealed brain cancer is now the leading cancer killer of children in the United States.

LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - Sally Curtin and her colleagues at the NCHS, part of the CDC, discovered brain tumors and leukemia are the two  most common childhood cancers and cause more than half of all childhood cancer deaths.

Though keywords such as "cancer" and "children" are usually connected to heartbreaking stories, Cutin's study actually uncovered positive findings.

In the CDC report, Curtin and her team found cancer-related deaths between the ages of 1-19-years-old declined 20 percent between 1999 and 2014.

Other findings included:

• The cancer death rate for males aged 1-19 years in 2014 was 30 percent higher than for females.
• Declines in cancer death rates during 1999-2014 were experienced among both white and black persons aged 1-19 years and for all 5-year age groups.
• During 1999-2014, brain cancer replaced leukemia as the most common cancer causing death among children and adolescents aged 1-19 years, accounting for 3 out of 10 cancer deaths in 2014.

The study stated: "Three out of 10 cancer deaths among children and adolescents aged 1-19 years in 1999 were due to leukemia, the most common site, whereas about one in four were due to brain cancer.

"By 2014, these percentages reversed and brain cancer was the most common site, accounting for 29.9 of total cancer deaths."

The number of deaths related to leukemia and brain cancer have not grown worse since the late 90s, it's just the treatment for other cancers have improved to the point where the more serious and faster-acting cancers seem worse than they really are.

David Arons, the CEO of the National Brain Tumor Society, released a statement in which he explained: "Pediatric brain tumors have not become deadlier over the years - survival rates for these patients have stayed relatively flat for decades.

"The reason these patients now face the highest mortality rates is because while other areas of research have made great strides in recent years, pediatric brain tumor research has not generated advances that have translated into meaningful clinical benefit for those vulnerable patients."

The National Cancer Institute reported: "In 1975, just over 50 percent of children diagnosed with cancer before age 20 years survived at least 5 years. In 2004-2010, more than 80 percent of children diagnosed with cancer before age 20 years survived at least 5 years.

"Improved treatments introduced in the 1970s realised the 5-year survival rate for childhood acute lymphoblastic leukemia from less than 10 percent in the 1960s to about 90 percent in 2003-2009. Survival rates for childhood non0Hodgkin lymphoma have also increased dramatically, from less than 50 percent in the late 1970s to 85 percent in 2003-2009."

As science progresses, the health of humanity does too. Please pray that God bless the eyes and minds of scientists. Pray that a cure to all cancers can be discovered.

Thank you, Lord, for your teachings. Please, Father, heal the sick, bless the researchers' hands and reign mercies upon us all.

Amen.

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