The Childhood Cancer Foundation (CCF) has helped 17,887 children and their families since it was founded 35 years ago, foundation officials said yesterday.
The inspiration for the foundation, which marked its 35th anniversary yesterday, was a National Science Council-funded study in 1981 on the impact of childhood cancers on families, which found that many families were struggling with huge financial burdens.
Several medical researchers established the foundation the following year to gather information and use their expertise to research childhood cancer treatment, as well as raise funds to help families that have children with cancer.
The foundation has been able to carry out its work thanks to the help of public donations, medical professionals and social workers, while the survival rates for childhood cancer sufferers has increased from about 70 percent to 90 percent over the past three decades.
The foundation held a news conference yesterday to promote its anniversary, during which several young cancer patients performed.
The Little Sparrows Chorus, made up of a dozen children, sang Today is Happiness (今天就是幸福).
A seven-year-old boy who lost his sight before he was one due to retinoblastoma — an eye cancer — played the Beauty and the Beast theme on the piano.
His mother said that although her son lost his eyesight at an early age, he was keen to learn to swim and play piano, and he had even learned how to play several songs faster than his elder brother.
A 20-year-old woman who was diagnosed with lymphocytic leukemia four years ago shared her experiences with chemotherapy and undergoing a stem cell transplant where the transplant material was provided by her younger brother.
She encouraged children to find joy even in times of sorrow.
Peggy Chen (陳佩琪), a pediatrician who is director of Taipei Municipal Hospital’s Heping branch Neonatology Division and the wife of Taipei Mayor Ko Wen-je (柯文哲), said she appreciates how much financial and mental support the foundation has given to the families.
Chen said she and Ko hope that all the children fighting cancer can recover as soon as possible and urged people to help by donating to and supporting such children.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
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