The American Cancer Society's (ACS) 2025 African American & Black Cancer Statistics Report was released this month.
It specifically highlights new info about African American & Black cancer mortality rates and the disproportionately elevated cancer burden compared to other racial groups.
ACS' report found Black patients have a lower five-year survival rate than white patients and have higher death rates for most cancers.
The good news is that the study showed cancer mortality rates among Black people overall are declining but still remain high in comparison to other races.
Valley ACS volunteer, Sonora Quest Laboratory COO, and two-time cancer survivor Sonya Engle is passionate about reminding other Black women in particular about the importance of early detection and prevention.
It's been almost thirty years since Engle lost her mother, Cynthia Brown, to breast cancer.
"She exercised, she ate right, she had annual mammograms," Engle said. "What she failed to do, unfortunately, is she found a lump and was kind of in denial about it."
Breast cancer took Brown's life at not even 50-years-old.
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"I had just had my 30th birthday, and I was heartbroken. It changed everything," Engle said. "What it made me realize is cancer is prevalent. It can be aggressive, it can wreck lives."
That wasn't the end of cancer's unfair grip on Engle's world either.
She, herself, was diagnosed with cervical cancer in her twenties, then breast cancer in her thirties.
"I wanted to do everything that I could to make a different future for me and for my little [daughter]... and for the rest of my family, I did not want that to continue to be our story," she said.
ACS Interim CEO Dr. Wayne A. I. Frederick highlighted the importance of knowing your genetics.
"We should know our family histories," he said. "It's key in the Black community where we tend to not talk about illness."
While family history is important, so is environment.
ACS' 'Voices of Black Women' study launched last year. It's the United States' largest behavioral and environmental study of cancer risk and outcomes in Black women.
The study is designed to better understand why Black women have been and continue to be disproportionately impacted by cancer, and experience greater systemic obstacles to prevention, screening, and survival.
"Knowledge is power and for us to understand, in particular, with Black women, what is happening underneath," said Engle.
Engle's daughter, Morgan, is in this fight to forge a different future. She is now part of this national study.
"My hope is with her being in the study, there will be insights, information that will change things," Engle said. "Then she doesn't have to go through that. And then my mother's story, my story could be used for good. That's the power of the information."
The 'Voices' study is now open in all 50 states. You must be a Black woman between the ages of 25 and 55 and have not already been diagnosed with cancer at any point.
The organization aims to enroll over 100,000 Black women across the U.S.
Dr. Frederick also urged lawmakers to protect and increase federal funding for life-saving cancer research.
"Help ensure more people in America have access to the care they need to prevent, detect, and treat cancer by protecting the Medicaid Program and extending the enhanced Affordable Care Act tax credits that have made health insurance affordable for millions of people nationwide for the first time," he said. "We have to recognize that if people have that type of access, it certainly will help."
