Lung cancer is the #1 cause of cancer death in the U.S., killing more people every year than breast cancer, prostate cancer, colon cancer, liver cancer, kidney cancer and melanoma – combined.

Why is the death rate so high? Right now, most lung cancers aren’t diagnosed until they’re in the late stages, when effective treatment and surgical options are limited. Diagnosis comes late because there are no effective screening methods for the general population, as there are for breast, prostate and colon cancer.

And unlike other types of cancer, lung cancer carries a stigma: most people at risk are current or former smokers, so some people assume they’ve brought the disease on themselves.

Progress against lung cancer depends on finding the answers we need through research, yet research funding for this disease lags far behind that for most other types of cancer. For fiscal year 2007, the three major sources of federal funding for cancer research—the National Cancer Institute, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and Department of Defense—provided the following research support for specific cancer sites, shown in dollars per death:

$23,754 – breast cancer
$11,959 – prostate cancer
$5,500 – colon cancer
$1,414 – lung cancer

Those numbers reflect a 23% drop in funding for lung cancer research between the years 2005-2007.

The bottom line: “Increased research funding is essential to future advances in screening and early detection, in identifying those who are at the greatest risk for lung cancer, and in the development of more effective lung cancer treatments,” says Mary Reid, PhD, Associate Member, Cancer Prevention and Population Sciences, at Roswell Park Cancer Institute.