The V Foundation is committed to beating pediatric cancers. Since 1993, The V Foundation has actively funded more than $4 million in pediatric grants. This summer we are putting a special emphasis on raising funds for pediatric cancer research.
Significant advances in therapy have dramatically increased survival rates for children with cancer and over the past 50 years, survival rates have gone from under 10% to more than 75%. Still, cancer remains the leading cause of death from disease for children under the age of 15. There is much more to do and every child denied the opportunity to “live happily ever after” is another reason to get the job done.
This year the V Wine Celebration is directing our Fund A Need to a four-year, $1 million grant at UCSF, led by Dr. Kate Matthay, who will expand on the great strides made in her 2001 V Foundation grant which focused on neuroblastoma. The five-year survival rate for neuroblastoma has risen from under 10% in the 1980s, to 40% today. In addition, there are now some long-term survivors among patients whose disease was initially unresponsive to standard therapies. Forty percent is certainly a great increase in the survival rate, but it's not good enough.
Let's raise our paddles high to help fight a form of cancer that affects so many of our smallest warriors, and the families who love them.
