Company Overview
Highlights
Promotes itself through corporate partnerships with companies like the Florida Department of Citrus and GlaxoSmithKline Consumer Healthcare.
The Society has funded 42 Nobel Prize laureates.
Relies on a network of more than 2 million volunteers nationwide.
Founded in 1913, the American Cancer Society focuses on conducting cancer research, serving cancer patients and their families, preventing cancer through public education, promoting laws and policies that benefit cancer patients, and educating health care providers. The organization has more than 3,400 local units across the country, and involves 2 million volunteers. The ACS was moved to the forefront of voluntary health organizations in the 1930s with the creation of the Women’s Field Army, which took to the streets in khaki uniforms to raise money and educate the public about cancer, encouraging people to speak openly about the disease for the first time.
The ACS’s primary goals are to prevent cancer, diminish suffering, and save lives. There are six ways it is working to achieve this goal:
• Seeking a cure the deadly disease through research.
• Providing accurate information about cancer to the public via its Cancer Information Services division.
• Aiming to eliminate cancer as a global health problem through its international program.
• Promoting laws that benefit cancer patients as a focus of its advocacy and public policy department.
• Educating people at the local level with community programs in the U.S.
• Securing major gifts and endowments via The American Cancer Society Foundation.
In terms of successes, American Cancer Society-funded scientists have established the link between cancer and smoking, demonstrated the effectiveness of the Pap smear in detecting cervical cancer, developed several cancer fighting drugs and biological response modifiers such as interferons (proteins that attack the growth of tumors), contributed to the dramatic increase in the cure rate for childhood leukemia, proved the safety and effectiveness of mammography, and more.
The ACS has committed roughly $3 billion to research, funding 42 Nobel Prize winners, often early in their careers before they had received recognition and monetary support for their work. Seventy-three percent of the American Cancer Society’s budget is allocated for program services, including research, prevention, patient support, and detection/treatment. The remaining 27 percent goes towards general management and fundraising.