Are you impressed with our beautiful pink cover recognizing Breast Cancer Awareness month? I hope so, and I do hope you stop and read the pages that give you — both men and women — information that can save your life.
As a breast-cancer survivor myself I know the critical need for timely mammograms. I was getting my annual gynecology checkup when the doctor said: “I don’t like what I feel here; let’s go upstairs and get you a mammogram right away!” I did, and within a week, I was at the office of renowned breast surgeon Dr. Karen Kostroff, being tested for breast cancer. I was lucky; after surgery they told me I did have Stage One breast cancer, but that only radiation, and a daily pill, were necessary.
I tremble to think about what could have happened if I had not had that annual check up. No doubt my story would be very different. I urge everyone to be checked annually — yes, even men can have breast cancer.
Our writers have valuable information for you, so read it and take action right away!
I am proud and privileged to offer the critically important information you will find in the Pink issue — our first to be published under the Schneps Community News Group ownership. Read it, save it, and pass it along to a friend.
October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, a time for us all to redouble our efforts to eradicate the second-leading killer of women in America.
Schneps Community News Group’s annual “Pink Paper” is dedicated to our local resources, researchers, support teams, and survivors — because we share the struggle, and are mindful of the sobering statistics and excruciating toll of this deadly disease. The American Cancer Society’s estimates for breast cancer in the United States for 2018 are:
• About 266,120 new cases of invasive breast cancer will be diagnosed in women in the United States, including 17,890 in New York.
• Approximately 40,920 women will die from breast cancer before the year’s end, including 2,390 in New York.
• One in eight American women will be diagnosed with the disease in her lifetime.
• Every two minutes, a woman in the U.S. is diagnosed with breast cancer.
• Every 13 minutes in the U.S., a woman dies of breast cancer in our country.
• About 85 percent of cases occur in women with no family history of breast cancer.
• At this time, there are more than 3.1 million people in the U.S. with a history of breast cancer, including women still being treated and those who have completed treatment.
Like most people, we have had friends and family battle cancer. Anyone who has watched the impact of this terrible disease on sufferers and their loved ones understands the urgency for a cure.
Some good news:
• There are more than 2.8-million breast-cancer survivors in the United States today.
• The five-year relative survival rate for female invasive-breast-cancer patients has jumped from 75 percent in the mid-1970s to 90 percent today.
These strides can be attributed to ordinary people who rise to the extraordinary occasion, demonstrating time and again the incredible strength and power of unity when affliction strikes.
Breast Cancer Awareness Month is an opportunity for our newspapers to share the stories of how local communities come together to battle breast cancer, and herald those suffering for the spirit needed to fight this disease during their difficult journey to good health.
We hope you enjoy our “Pink Paper” edition and its inspirational stories. If you are looking for additional details about breast cancer, opportunities to volunteer, or resources for someone fighting the disease, please reach out to the American Cancer Society at cancer.org/about-us/local/new-york.html.
Victoria Schneps-Yunis
President and Publisher
Schneps Community News Group
