Unions save lives. Just ask family child care provider Rosa Martinez.

Martinez, from the Bronx by way of the Dominican Republic, suffered from two forms of cancer — but beat the disease thanks, in part, to the health insurance won for providers by the UFT.

“Thank God, through the UFT I have a second chance in life,” the grateful Martinez said. “I nearly died. But because of the insurance, I was able to go to a great hospital with great doctors.”

Martinez runs Shining Angel Group Family Daycare in the Pelham Parkway North section of the Bronx, where she and two assistants care for 16 children ages 1 to 7. Like many family child care providers, Martinez had no health insurance before the UFT won it for them.

The city’s 21,000 providers overwhelmingly voted to join the union in October 2007 after a long campaign to win the right to unionize. The providers’ first contract, ratified in January 2010, included access to health insurance as its signature gain.

Martinez said she immediately signed up for the health benefits.

“I hadn’t had health insurance for a year,” she said. “At my husband’s job, they don’t provide family health insurance. I was very happy and excited. I couldn’t believe they were giving providers the chance to have insurance.”

It was a lucky thing: In April 2012, Martinez began to lose weight and felt tired all the time. When she became dehydrated and passed out, she went to Bronx Lebanon Hospital and was told to visit a primary care doctor who performed an endoscopy and discovered 27 polyps in her stomach. A colonoscopy turned up another 50 polyps.

Martinez then underwent surgery at Weill Cornell Medical Center in Manhattan to remove the polyps, which her doctors discovered were cancerous. They also removed her entire colon.

Martinez was in the hospital from July through September 2012 for treatment for her cancer and then another three months because of an infection after her surgery that caused her to lose almost 100 pounds and her kidneys to fail. “You couldn’t even recognize me,” she said.

So what did all of this cost her?

Medical treatment for cancer can easily cause bankruptcy for the uninsured, but Martinez paid just $75 for her surgery. Her monthly visits with an oncologist and continued care are also entirely covered by insurance.

As a result, Martinez has been able to keep her child care program open.

“I’m very thankful the UFT was there to fight for providers,” she said.