Blood Cancer Fact A Day: Day 25

Editor's note: 

In August Manassas City Council voted in favor of a proclamation declaring September Blood Cancer Awareness Month. 
As a result, Patch will publish several articles this month with about blood cancer. 

The facts were compiled and provided by Manassas resident Rich Zavadowski, a blood cancer survivor who was instrumental in getting local lawmakers to consider the proclamation. 

The five-year survival rate for non-Hodgkins lymphoma and leukemia is about 10 percent lower for African-Americans than whites.

Nearly 50 percent of all cancer drugs newly approved by the US Food and Drug Administration in the past 12 years were first approved for blood cancers.

Blood cancer research has paved the way for better therapies for many types of other cancers and diseases like rheumatoid arthritis.

Leukemia is the 10th most frequently-occurring type of cancer in all races and ethnicities.

Age is the most significant risk factor for developing myeloma. People under 45 rarely develop the disease, while those aged 67 or older are at greater risk.

About 31 percent more males are living with leukemia than females. And more males than females are diagnosed with leukemia and die from it.

From 2006 to 2010, myeloma was the eighth most commonly diagnosed cancer in black males and the seventh most commonly diagnosed cancer among black females. Visit lightthenight.org/nca, lymphoma.org and rich.TeamZavadowski.com for more information on blood cancers.