While reading through The New Your Times Picture Your Life After Cancer site, I came upon Tyler’s picture and post. Tyler points out that, according to the American Cancer Society, 1 in 2 men and 1 in 3 women will be diagnosed with cancer in their respective lifetimes. Those are pretty high statistics for all of us, but it was Tyler’s closing sentence that struck me.

I hope I am the one and you are the two.

It’s not fair. The odds are stacked against us, it seems, in regards to carcinogenesis. It’s inevitable. No, no it’s not. The American Cancer Society also reports that nearly two-thirds of all cancers can be prevented – stopped entirely before they occur – via tobacco cessation and changes in nutrition and physical activity (to reach a healthy BMI). For perspective, approximately 1.5 million new cancer cases will be diagnosed in the U.S. alone this year. 1.5 million people will hear, “You have cancer,” for the first time. 1.5 million lives and families’ lives will be changed forever. Yet, if all two-thirds of those cancers could be prevented by doing what we know works, close to 990,000 people this year would likely never experience cancer related to lifestyle behaviors. In addition, numerous cancers have high survival rates if detected at early stages, and it seems like we are still pulling, pushing, and persuading people to complete routine cancer screenings.

While I don’t know the specifics of Tyler’s diagnosis, I doubt the cancer was related to lifestyle behaviors or even screenable per today’s various cancer screening guidelines. Still, Tyler’s picture and post remind me of my lifetime relative risk of cancer which then leads me to think about prevention and early detection. I want to do everything I can so that I am “one of the two,” and I want to do everything I can so that there are no more “ones” like Tyler.