Petition for Increased Federal Funding for Childhood Cancer Research (Goal =1,000,000 signatures)

Petition Background (Preamble)

Cancer is the leading cause of death by disease in children in the United States. Cancer kills more than 2,500 children every year and over 13,500 kids will be diagnosed with cancer in the next 365 days. Though these numbers are significant, the potential market is too small to attract the attention of private industry. This makes the role of the taxpayer-funded National Cancer Institute (NCI) especially critical.  However, only a small percentage of its budget is dedicated to childhood cancer research. The result is that children are dying every day waiting for promising new treatments. As a society, we have an obligation to protect our most vulnerable citizens, the thousands of children who are fighting life-threatening cancer.

Petition Signature

I, the undersigned, support an increase in pediatric cancer funding by the National Cancer Institute with the goal of eliminating cancer as a threat to all children.