My sister Connie, whose bone marrow had saved my life five years earlier, lost her life to pancreatic cancer in 1998. Our mom was then diagnosed with pancreatic cancer a month later and she succumbed to the disease in 2001. Since that time, we have lost friends and loved ones, most recently my dear friends Rachel Barron (2014) and Lisa Knight (2019).

We are living through a surreal period with the COVID crisis, and I am not here to deflect attention away from it, but pancreatic cancer claims more lives in the US than breast cancer, liver cancer, kidney cancer, prostate cancer, ovarian cancer, melanoma, lymphoma or leukemia and it continues to climb. Only research will change the needle on pancreatic cancer and the proceeds of the LA Cancer Challenge are funneled directly to pancreatic cancer researchers in the form of seed grants (you can see last year's recipients at http://pancreatic.org/research/seed-grant-program/seed-grant-recipients/) so please join my team or make a donation. The LA Cancer Challenge is a virtual event this year, due to COVID, so you can participate from anywhere.