Your Statistic, My Loved One: Child Leukemia In Our Community
This is the latest op-ed submitted by Soudary Kittivong-Greenbaum. About every three minutes, one person in the U.S. is diagnosed with a blood cancer. Meaning, last year, roughly 156,420 people in the U.S. were diagnosed with leukemia, lymphoma or myeloma. According to the American Cancer Society, leukemia is the most common cancers in kids and teens, but child leukemia is considered rare. To me, it’s one child too prevalent. Last month, Immanuel, my younger cousin’s child, was diagnosed with leukemia. He is seven. Immanuel lives in my hometown in Alaska. He loves his little sister, and his mom and dad. Loves playing with play doh, and anything related to cars. He moved to a new school this year. It’s hard to think of what’s ahead and not feel a weight for him. I first met Immanuel when he was just six months, on a visit back to Anchorage. This was a few years before I had my own child. My cousin Jenny held him up under each of his arms, handing him to me, his arms …