History
The idea for the charity grew by chance, out of the eagerness of a group of women to organise a fashion show to fund a children's intensive care heart unit at Guy's Hospital, London. Established in 1990, the charity’s work has expanded dramatically. As well as an Education and Awareness team with a schools programme providing information, education and advice that reaches pupils all over the UK, the charity funds and organises a forum for professionals to ensure information and best practice sharing. It sponsors a teenage conference, Find Your Sense of Tumour, an International Conference on Cancer and the Adolescent and have just appointed the world’s first Professor of Adolescent Cancer Medicine.
Each day in the UK, 6 teenagers will find out they have cancer. That is over 2,200 new diagnoses each year. In many cases, cancer in teens is not picked up early enough and symptoms are dismissed as growing pains or sports injuries. Because teenagers are undergoing growth spurts, their cancers grow faster than other age groups and they can be at greater risk.
Cancer is the most common cause of non-accidental death in teens and young adults in the UK. By the age of 15 teens have a 1 in 600 chance of developing cancer. By the age of 24 young adults will have had a 1 in 285 chance of developing cancer. In the last 30 years the incidence of cancer in the teenage and young adult group has increased by 50% and for the first time ever, the number of teens with cancer now exceeds the number of children with cancer.
Read more about this topic: Teenage Cancer Trust
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“It may be well to remember that the highest level of moral aspiration recorded in history was reached by a few ancient Jews—Micah, Isaiah, and the rest—who took no count whatever of what might not happen to them after death. It is not obvious to me why the same point should not by and by be reached by the Gentiles.”
—Thomas Henry Huxley (1825–95)
“The history of this country was made largely by people who wanted to be left alone. Those who could not thrive when left to themselves never felt at ease in America.”
—Eric Hoffer (1902–1983)
“Let it suffice that in the light of these two facts, namely, that the mind is One, and that nature is its correlative, history is to be read and written.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)