City, Children’s Cancer Fund Kick Off Childhood Cancer Awareness Month with Be The Match Donor Registration Event

September 3, 2019

Today, Mayor Tim Keller and the City of Albuquerque joined The Children’s Cancer Fund of New Mexico (CCFNM), UNM Pediatric Oncology Program, and Be the Match to kick off Childhood Cancer Awareness Month with a bone marrow donor drive on Civic Plaza.

“Supporting children who are battling cancer should be a year round priority. We’re kicking off the month of awareness for this important cause by calling on the community to come together as One Albuquerque and find out if you might ‘be the match’ that saves a child’s life,” Mayor Keller said.

“Childhood cancer is an important issue that affects families throughout our state. Our goal is to increase awareness that children and young adults also get cancer,” said Dr. Jessica Valdez, Assistant Professor, Pediatric Hematology Oncology, Department of Pediatrics, University of New Mexico. “We hope that this increased awareness leads to earlier detection, increased survival, more research allotments and that most importantly, that one day no parent will ever have to hear ‘your child has cancer’.”

Children battling leukemia and other cancers can be saved by a bone marrow transplant. But every year, lives are lost in cases where doctors struggle to find a suitable donor match. Hispanics, Native Americans, African Americans and Asian Americans have significantly lower chances than the general population of finding a suitable donor. Be The Match’s database of more than 20 million volunteers is helping save lives, but it is critically important that donor volunteers in diverse places like New Mexico are added to the registry.

Persons between the ages of 18 and 44 are encouraged to sign up and potentially save the life of a child.

For more information, call (505) 243-3618 or visit www.ccfnm.org.