September was Prostate Cancer Awareness Month. The death rate from prostate cancer is 23.0 per 100,000 and from breast cancer 22.6 per 100,000 per year. Very similar statistics and yet the funds allocated for breast cancer research are almost three times the amount allotted for prostate cancer research, and the amount of publicity related to prostate cancer pales compared to the publicity related to breast cancer.

Each disease can have particularly horrific aspects and it’s not a competition to see which is worse. They’re both plenty bad enough, although fortunately there are a lot of long-term survivors of both diseases.

More research is needed in order to make more progress against both of these all-too-common killers, and it would be nice (not to mention fair) if the UFT and the New York Teacher gave the same attention to raising funds for prostate cancer that they do for breast cancer.

Bernard A. and Harriette Bilawsky, retired