“The journey of childhood cancer does not end after the final treatment has been given and the announcement that a child/adolescent is now cancer free. Along with the impressive gains in survival have come “late effects,” which may impair some of the survivors’ health and quality of life”. According to Childhood Cancer International (CCI): “Patterns of late effects have emerged among subgroups of childhood cancer survivors that have contributed to the categorization of childhood cancer as a chronic disease with implications for continuing care. By the time survivors are 45 years of age, more than 95% of them will have a chronic health problem”.
To raise awareness about the magnitude of the problem, the Spanish Federation of Childhood Cancer Parents, a founding member of CCI, a network of more than 177 childhood cancer parents and survivors national coalitions and grassroots organizations as well as childhood cancer support organizations, in more than 90 countries and 6 continents around the world, is launching in June a campaign inviting survivors from all over the world to tell us how is their own life after cancer. We are inviting governments, development institutions, civil society organizations and resource institutions to ACT NOW and DO MORE for childhood cancer survivors and their families:
Niños con cancer (Children with Cancer), joins this international campaign with two actions:
The author of the photographs is Iban Retegi, director of #cuandoerapequeño.
When the doctors explained to Ángel that his body was home to a number of “bad cells”, he replied: “Oh, yes? Then, what I have is cellulite!” During treatment, Ángel didn’t lose his smile and showed no fear. He made his best friends in the hospital. Ángel hasn’t decided yet if he wants to be a policeman or a reporter.
Fragment of Sergio’s testimony, 20 years. He had leukemia with 7 years.
“One of the hardest things of my life was when I came back to school after a long period receiving lessons at home because I wasn’t able to go to school. This day arrived, finally I was going to see all my colleagues and friends, I was going to get a hint of normalcy. Unfortunately, as you can imagine, it was not that way. It was just the opposite. Everything, absolutely everything had changed. Nearly all my classmates excluded me and called me “carcinogenic shit stay apart from me, you are contagious” day after day”
Fragment of Vanesa’s testimony, 23 years. She had ovarian cancer with 10 years.
“And finally the best news arrived: The cancer had disappeared. I didn’t do any type of celebration or party for this reason, simply I returned home with the intention to live and go back to being a normal teenager but my life had changed, I was not the same person and there were a thousand things in my head that had been changed”.
La Federación Española de Padres de NIÑOS CON CÁNCER es una entidad sin ánimo de lucro y de utilidad pública, nacida en 1990 e integrada por 22 Asociaciones de padres de NIÑOS CON CÁNCER. A su vez, NIÑOS CON CÁNCER se incluye en Childhood Cancer International, una organización formada en 1994 por uno de nuestros fundadores y que hoy cuenta con 181 organizaciones miembro de 90 países distintos.
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