People across Merseyside are being encouraged to show their support for everyone affected by cancer ahead of World Cancer Day on February 4th.
Currently, 8.2 million people die from cancer worldwide every year, out of which, 4 million people die prematurely, aged 30-69 years old.
In the North West more than four people are diagnosed with cancer every hour, nearly 110 every day and more than 750 every week. In fact, every year around 39,400 are diagnosed in the region alone.
For the first time, Cancer Research UK is working in partnership with three of the UK’s leading cancer charities Breast Cancer Care, Anthony Nolan and the Movember Foundation. Their aim is to unite Merseyside and the UK and help transform the lives of millions of people affected by the disease.
The charities are calling on men, women and children in the region to pick up a Unity Band and wear it with pride on 4th February.
Workers coming into Liverpool Lime Street Station on the will be able to pick up a Unity Band between 7am and 9am when Cancer Research UK staff and volunteers will be doing a bucket collection for World Cancer Day.
Staff from Riverside Housing will also collect for World Cancer Day and give out Unity Bands at the station in the afternoon between 4pm and 6pm.
In Bootle, Cancer Research UK nurses will be working with NHS South Sefton Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) in support of World Cancer Day, which is holding a raft of events at the recently-opened Strand by Me shop on Wednesday and Thursday.
Merseyside solicitors will also be uniting for World Cancer Day on Thursday morning at a special legacies breakfast seminar at The Royal Hospital.
Money raised from the Unity Bands will fund breakthroughs in scientific research; save and improve the lives of people with blood cancers; provide high quality care, support and information for people with breast cancer, and fund research and support services to tackle prostate and testicular cancer.
Research matters as one-in-two people born after 1960 will be diagnosed with some form of cancer in their lifetime, but with the help of research survival has doubled. Today, two-in-four people survive their cancer for at least 10 years, the aim within 20 is for three in four people to survive their cancer.
Alison Barbuti, Cancer Research UK spokesperson for Merseyside, said: “World Cancer Day provides an opportunity for people in our region, all across the UK and beyond, to unite and show that together we can do something about cancer.
“So many of us have been affected by the disease, which is why on February 4 we are calling on the people of Merseyside to join together and wear their Unity Band with pride.”