March 24, 2020
Dear Friends,
As recently as 1900, 1 of every 5 children born in the U.S. didn’t live to celebrate a fifth birthday. Tuberculosis, pneumonia, and diarrhea caused more than half of all deaths across the general population. The average life expectancy was just 50 years in the U.S. and only 31 worldwide.
PCF supporters know well that at the time of our founding in 1993, 1 in 7 men were diagnosed with prostate cancer every year, resulting in more than 40,000 deaths annually, with the problem expected to get worse with the aging of the Baby Boomer population. Funding for research was scant, and there were few treatment options available. Investment was insufficient to fund the kind of scientific breakthroughs needed to bring more treatments to clinics. It was a unique new data-driven approach introduced by our foundation that changed the field of cancer research forever.
Our supporters know that our focus on hard data and analysis is what sets PCF’s funding approach apart from other medical research organizations. Our venture philanthropy strategy looks at the totality of the cancer research landscape – the current scientific needs, the emergent opportunities, and the market needs – to determine the precise point in the pipeline your investment is most likely to have an impact. That’s why our PCF community relies on the smartest applications of their private philanthropy through PCF’s conservatively assessed 30:1 leverage, maximizing their individual impacts on the world of cancer research and scientific advancement.
Thanks to your support, those leveraged investments are powering PCF’s analytics-driven approach to scientific research funding. PCF relies on data here as well, implementing a competitive peer review process by a jury of the world’s top cancer researchers to find the most promising ideas from teams of top scientists around the world and brilliant young researchers early in their careers, funding them all with the condition that they must share the discoveries from their work with other researchers, institutions, and specialists. This invigorates the field with fresh approaches to standard ideas and energizes research with new ones, helping to accelerate more and better treatments for millions of men and families.
By working together, the power of our partnership has fueled over a quarter-century of historic scientific discovery, bringing people and institutions together to solve complicated problems. By clicking here, you’ll find a PDF of some information on proven, data-validated ways you and your family can promote wellness, prevent disease, and sustain optimal health through one of the most powerful tools available: our daily diet. This hard-earned information gleaned from medical research is part of the solution that can help families everywhere defeat disease challenges of all types and sizes, and is applicable to promoting overall human health. We hope you’ll use this information and share it widely with friends and loved ones alike.
In health, and with best wishes,
Benjamin Engel
Chief Development Officer