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Cause more important than ever
Theresa Seraphim g
South Peace News
The evening of June 5 was a time of hope in communities in our region.
That’s when people walked – in Slave Lake, around the track at Roland Michener Secondary School – in the Relay for Life to raise money to help find a cure for cancer, a disease that experts are saying will afflict one in four people over a lifetime.
Therefore, it is safe to say that most of us in this geographical area have been touched, in some way, by this illness, having suffered it ourselves or having known someone who has.
The “victory lap” of cancer survivors – easily the most moving part of the whole event – reminded all present that cancer can be beaten and hard work is being done to ensure that happens.
The fact that participants did their walk in a cold rain spoke volumes about their commitment to the cause.
That cause now seems more important than ever before.
The Chalk River nuclear plant - which produces 30 per cent of the world’s medical isotopes, used in cancer treatments - has been closed, perhaps permanently, and the feds have announced Canada will get out of isotope production in a few years’ time.
That means alternative sources of isotopes will have to be found, for the sake of people’s health and lives – including some in our own region.
Also, a federal government minister called the isotope shortage a “sexy” situation, seeing a chance for political advancement rather than the reality of the suffering caused by cancer – this, in spite of the fact she has lost two family members to the disease.
As an Opposition MP asked in the House of Commons, “What’s so sexy about cancer?”
Of course, it’s a rhetorical question, to which those battling cancer, those who have lost family members and friends to the disease, and those relentlessly searching for a way to eradicate it, would all respond, “Nothing.”
And that is why we need events like Relay for Life.
We have come a long way in that cancer is not as much of a death sentence as it was, but we have a ways to go. We need to be reminded of the reality of cancer – of the effect it has, not only on the person diagnosed with it but also on their family and friends. We need to remember that, as the relay organizers say, cancer never sleeps.
We need hope. And we got that on June 5 – thanks to those who know, first-hand, about hope.
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