SANTA MONICA, CA, May 30, 2013 —– The Prostate Cancer Foundation (PCF) has received $7.7 million from their partner Movember, the global men’s health charity that gets men to grow and women to support the moustache for thirty days each November to raise funds and awareness for cancers affecting men. The PCF will allocate the $7.7 million to find better treatments and ultimately a cure, by funding accelerated research.
To date, Movember has donated more than $18 million to PCF to support prostate cancer research, funding nine game-changing PCF Research Enterprise awards in the U.S. and Great Britain. The data generated from these Movember-funded projects has changed the daily practice of oncology for every patient with advanced prostate cancer in the Western World.
Movember-supported projects through PCF have ranged from prostate cancer research in clinical trials that helped accelerate the approval of two new drugs, Abiraterone and Enzalutamide, both used to treat metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer; to a Movember Challenge Award at the University of Michigan led by Drs. Arul Chinnaiyan and Ken Pienta. This Movember Challenge Award created the world’s first integrated precision medicine program to perform genomic analysis from patient biopsies. These results are discussed in a panel of multidisciplinary professionals including oncologists, bioethicists, pharmacologists and genetic counselors and customized therapy is suggested.
The SU2C-PCF Prostate Dream Team Translational Cancer Research Grant, funded in conjunction with Movember, will provide up to $10 million over three years working to identify the causes of resistance in an individual patient and help doctors tailor therapy for them. Movember will fund $2.5 million of the Dream Team, along with $2.5 million from SU2C, and $5 million from PCF. This collaborative award will represent six world-class institutions; four campuses of the University of California (San Francisco, Los Angeles, Santa Cruz, Davis), Oregon Health & Science University in Portland, and the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, Canada.
“We are grateful to be partnered with Movember. What started out as a quirky idea among friends has turned into a global phenomenon,” said Jonathan W. Simons, MD, president and CEO of PCF. “No other organization in history has been this successful in moving the awareness needle and bringing in more dollars to support much needed research for prostate cancer and men’s health. The power of the Mo is encouraging discussion and saving lives.”
PCF looks forward to providing updates on this life-saving research and announcing several new Movember-PCF Challenge Awards in the next few months.
“Movember is committed to funding collaborative, innovative research with our partners at PCF to help men affected by prostate cancer,” said Adam Garone, CEO and co-founder of Movember. “Thanks to our Mo community, Movember has become the world’s largest non-government funder of prostate cancer research.”
Prostate cancer is the second-leading cause of cancer death for men in the United States and currently affects more than two million American men. One in six men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer in their lifetime.
About Movember
Movember aims to forever change the face of men’s health through the power of the moustache, by raising awareness and funds for prostate and testicular cancer initiatives. The funds raised are directed to programs run directly by the Movember Foundation and our men’s health partners in each country. Together, the channels work to ensure that Movember funds are supporting a broad range of innovative, world-class programs in line with our strategic goals, in the areas of Awareness & Education, Survivorship and Research. Since 2003, 3 million participants have raised over $440MM for the cause, with official Movember campaigns taking place in 21 countries. For more information please visit www.movember.com. Movember is a registered 501(c)(3) charity.
About the Prostate Cancer Foundation
The Prostate Cancer Foundation (PCF) is the world’s leading philanthropic organization funding and accelerating research. Founded in 1993, PCF has raised more than $530 million and provided funding to over 1,600 research projects at nearly 200 institutions in 16 countries around the world. PCF advocates for greater awareness of prostate cancer and more efficient investment of governmental research funds supporting transformational cancer research. Our efforts have helped produce a 20-fold increase in U.S. government funding for prostate cancer. More information about PCF can be found at www.pcf.org.
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