If you head down to the National Mall in D.C. over the next two weeks you’ll see 27,400 blue flags placed in front of the U.S. Capitol.
They represent the number of Americans under 50 who will be diagnosed with colorectal cancer this year.
“I should be at home with a husband that should still be on this earth,” Simone Ledward Boseman told the crowd Tuesday morning at the United in Blue rally.
Her husband, “Black Panther” actor Chadwick Boseman, died from colorectal cancer at the age of 43.
“It makes me angry that a disease so treatable took him from me, when all we needed to start out with was knowledge,” she said.
The United in Blue rally joined dozens of nonprofits together with Fight Colorectal Cancer to demand more federal funding for research on the disease, specifically establishing a $20 million research program within the Defense Department.
“I served in the Middle East multiple tours. I got exposed to the burn pits, and I got diagnosed with two primary cancers simultaneously,” said Republican Rep. Mark Green, of Tennessee.
“I ignored the symptoms. And nine years ago, I was diagnosed with colon cancer. I did the radiation and lost a foot and a half of my colon,” Green said.
He and others advocated for early detection and legislation that would make it easier for patients to obtain screenings through their health insurance.
New Jersey Democratic Rep. Donald Payne Jr. lost his father to the disease.
“After my father’s death, I went for my first colonoscopy,” Payne said. “I probably wouldn’t have gone had he not succumb to the disease. But when I had my first colonoscopy, they found 13 polyps. So I was on my way.”
The blue flags on the National Mall will be in place until March 23.
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