Kilili donates $250 to anti-cancer group

CNMI Delegate Gregorio Kilili C. Sablan showed his support for cancer awareness efforts in the community by donating to the Commonwealth Cancer Association last Friday.

Sablan presented a $250 check to CCA board members led by president Bud White and staffers at the non-profit organization’s office in Gualo Rai.

Sablan said that Friday’s donation is only the first of the several donations that he and the Kilili for Congress Committee plan to make to help organizations that have the most impact in the community.

CCA is a community-based non-profit organization dedicated to promoting cancer awareness and prevention as well as providing patient support services.

Sablan described the association as “very organized, very focused, and with a purpose and mission.

Sablan also recently donated some office chairs to Sr. Remedio school. “Where we can help, we help,” he said.

White praised Sablan for making the donation “out of his own pocket and not from congressional office.”

“It’s very generous and we’re very, very much appreciative…It’s things like this that keeps us going,” White told Saipan Tribune.

White is optimistic that CCA will receive more donations in the coming weeks leading to the Marianas March Against Cancer, the group’s largest signature annual fundraiser for cancer programs in the Commonwealth.

CCA, White said, is working on getting federal grants and other funding to expand their community involvement through training more volunteers who can go out and inform the public about the importance of early detection and prevention for cancer.

In August 2011, about 30 volunteers graduated from CCA’s six-week breast and cervical cancer health outreach training program and White said they want to “double” that number this year so there will be more volunteers who can talk to men about prostate cancer and to women about early detection for breast and cervical cancers through mammograms, breast self-examination, and pap smear tests.

“We want to have another training and we want to get more people on the ground, out talking to the community, because it’s only through awareness and early detection that we can detect cancer early,” said White.

For more information, contact CCA at 682-0050 or email cca@ccamarianas.org.