Jill Biden Urges Americans to Make Time for Cancer Screenings: 'Put Your Health First ... Don't Delay'
Erin Scott First Lady Dr. Jill Biden
First Lady Dr. Jill Biden has a reminder on World Cancer Day — and it's one she knows that can be easy to forget.
Take care of yourself, she writes in a message to the American public, shared with PEOPLE.
"Life is hectic. There's work, kids, parents, commuting, errands to run, a never-ending to-do list — and for the past two years we've been dealing with a global pandemic on top of everything else in our daily lives," the first lady, 70, writes.
"I get it," she continues. "The last thing you have time for, or want to do, is get your cancer screenings. But today, on World Cancer Day, I'm asking you to put your health first, just for a moment. If you're like millions of other Americans, you may have missed a pap smear, colonoscopy, mammogram, or another critical cancer screening in the last two years of the pandemic — but cancer doesn't stop for COVID."
"So, if you've put off going to the doctor, schedule your appointment today," Biden urges. "If you've put off your recommended cancer screenings, don't delay them any longer."
The issue is personal for the first lady and her family, and they have long spoken publicly about how cancer has darkened their lives — son Beau died of brain cancer in 2015 — while motivating them to work toward reducing its threat.
"Cancer touches all of us in some way and it doesn't care if you're busy," she writes in her new message, signed with an "XO, Jill."
"Early detection of cancer could save your life and there's nothing on your to-do list more important than that," she writes before encouraging the public to use cancer.gov/screeningtests to "find out more about the screenings you may need at ... book your appointment, and spread the word today!"
(Seriously, she adds in a postscript, "share this! Share it with your friends, your families, your Facebook friends from high school, your work colleague from three jobs ago. More than 9.5 million cancer screenings were missed in the last two years.")
Earlier this week, the Biden White House announced they were relaunching their "Cancer Moonshot" program focused on reducing deaths from cancer by 50 percent in the next 25 years and to improve the lives of people and families dealing with a cancer diagnosis.
The first lady spoke at a Wednesday kickoff event alongside President Joe Biden.
"Certain words have the power to make time stop: Malignant. Aggressive. Terminal. Cancer," she said. "Like a spell, they still the air around us. Frozen in place, we feel the world we knew slipping away. In the span of a breath, a thousand questions fill our minds. 'What can I do? How do I tell people? Why did this happen?' "
"For Joe and me, [cancer] has stolen our joy," she continued. "It left us broken in our grief. But through that pain, we found purpose, strengthening our fortitude for this fight to end cancer as we know it."
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