Tallahassee Joins St. Jude’s in Fighting Childhood Cancer

The St. Jude Children's Research Hospital Walk/Run to End Childhood Cancer kicks off in Tallahassee on Saturday at the SouthWood Town Center.

This free 5K course that winds through scenic Central Park Lake is encouraging more than 50 cities and their participants to team up or individually raise funds. The organization wants to spread awareness to support the children and families that battle childhood cancer each year.

September is National Childhood Cancer Awareness Month and St. Jude is known for being one of the top leaders in the fight to cure and support childhood cancer.

According to Atlantic Coast Liaison for St. Jude, Marie Lofton, they have been more successful than other hospitals when treating children with aggressive cancers.

"St. Jude has the world’s best survival rates for some of the most aggressive childhood cancers and treatments invented at St. Jude have helped push the overall childhood cancer survival rate from 20 percent to 80 percent since we opened more than 50 years ago," Lofton said. "St. Jude is working to drive the overall survival rate for childhood cancer to 90 percent in the next decade.”

Donations received from the event go directly to support the St. Jude Children's Hospital’s mission of finding cures and saving children at no cost to the family. Teams that raise $100 or more will receive a t-shirt.

To register, donate or volunteer for this year’s Walk/Run to End Childhood Cancer visit stjude.org/walkrun.