Childhood Cancer Awareness Month

Every day in the UK, 10 children and young people will receive the devastating news that they have cancer. Of those 10, two will not survive. Of those that survive, many will have long-term side-effects that may significantly impact their lives forever.

Childhood Cancer Awareness Month takes place every September. This Childhood Cancer Awareness Month 2025, we’re asking for your help to give every child the chance to grow up and fulfill their dreams.

What is Childhood Cancer Awareness Month?

Childhood Cancer Awareness Month, also known as CCAM, aims to generate awareness and support for children suffering from cancer. Every day in the UK, 10 children and young people will receive the devastating news that they have cancer. Of those 10, two will not survive. Of those that survive, many will have long-term side-effects that may significantly impact their lives forever.

Always By your Side

35 years of Childhood Cancer Awareness month, 35 years of Children with Cancer UK supporting families affected by childhood cancer. Children with Cancer UK stand by families’ sides and fund new less toxic treatments, improving the quality of life of those affected, support families throughout their journeys, and moments away from the day to day stresses.

Getting a childhood cancer diagnosis affects everyone in that family. One day everything is fine, the next day life changes. A family enters a new normal, full of unknowns and uncertainties of what a cancer journey and hospital stay might look like.

Many questions about how it might be like to be in the hospital. What is it like to be surrounded by strangers; away from home. What will the day look like? What happens during treatments? When can families be together? Will you make new friends? What will my medical treatment look like?What research has been done for my cancer type? Who will be by my side?

You hear the news that someone close to you has had a cancer diagnosis, you want to help, butare not sure how you can be by their side and show your support.

This Childhood Cancer Awareness Month let Children with Cancer UK’s Corry show you how everyone can be part in this journey, fundraising to finding better treatment in the better future, support their loved one, even from afar, tell them that you are ‘always by your side’.

When is Childhood Cancer Awareness month?

Childhood Cancer Awareness Month, also known as CCAM, aims to generate awareness and support for children suffering from cancer.

This is the reality for 10 children every day.

Every day 10 children are diagnosed with cancer.

Donate today so we can continue to be by their side and support families with new groundbreaking research and breaks away from hospital visits.

Donate now

Donate today

Donate today to help fund research into developing less harmful treatments so that children like Dulcie not only survive cancer but can also grow up happy and healthy.

Make a donation

Support saves lives

From one-off donations and corporate sponsorship, to marathons or tea parties, your contributions support our cases, and can also lead to invaluable personal growth.

Get involved

Fundraising ideas

Take a look at some suggestions and watch this page as we introduce more fun ideas for raising money to help children with cancer.

Way to fundraise →

How you are helping

Your generous support is helping us to fund important pioneering research that will help to give children with cancer a better chance to fulfil their dreams.

Dr Karin Straathof – University College London

We’ve teamed up with Dr Karin Straathof at University College London Cancer Institute, who’s working on a project which aims to ‘reprogram’ the T-cells in the body so they can recognise and kill cancer cells.

Whilst T-cells are always patrolling the body in search of infected cells, they ignore cancer cells which are shielded. Dr Straathof wants to equip these cells with additional abilities (a bit like a powerup in a video game) to overcome this and get better results.

The project got underway in January 2024 and is expected to last 24 months. Thanks to supporters like you, we’ve been able to contribute a grant amount of £231,742.

Find out more

Professor Clifford – Newcastle University Centre for Cancer

We’re incredibly proud to be supporting the INSTINCT programme led by Professor Clifford. It’s an innovative collaborative initiative between the Newcastle University Centre for Cancer, the UCL Institute of Child Health and the Institute of Cancer Research.

The aim of the programme, which started in 2014, is to carry out vital research into the causes of high risk paediatric brain tumours, and find the best ways to treat them. Thanks supporters like you, we’ve been able to help move this research onto the next stage.

Find out more

Previous years in Childhood Cancer Awareness Month

Each year, we raise awareness of Childhood Cancer Awareness Month in the form of events and stories. Here are a few of our previous milestones.

2024: Kids Like Us – a powerful film about children with cancer

Children with Cancer UK is proud to introduce you to a powerful 90-minute film produced by Echo Velvet (the producers of ITV’s critically acclaimed documentary It’s Showtime) and follows the extraordinary lives of eight remarkable young people from across the UK and US who have faced the unimaginable.

Kids Like Us is a landmark documentary feature which will fundamentally change the way `we view childhood cancer and the issues that surround it.

Read biographies

2023: A hug is such a simple thing

A hug is a wordless gesture that says so much. A hug is care. And understanding. Nothing else can blanket you so instantly in warmth, and love, like a hug can. Hugs are for everyone, anywhere, any time: our friends, our family, our pet. A hug can be quick and gentle, or long and wonderfully crushing.

Some hugs are pure joy: an exhilarated embrace of celebration for all our greatest achievements – those exams we thought we’d never get through, seeing that finish line of a marathon, or hearing a doctor say you’re all clear.

But hugs are for sadder days too – the comforting reassurance you need in times of bad, or even frightening news. When you feel like you can’t go on, a hug can be the tiniest moment that gives you the strength to carry on.

All hugs – be they big, small, gentle, strong, happy, sad – come from the heart. And when you’re in one you can feel with all of yours: you’re not alone.

Donate today

2022: When I grow up…

Meet Eve, lover of all things showbiz and living with a cancer diagnosis. We asked Eve, 13 what she wants to be when she grows up? Eve was diagnosed with craniopharyngioma, a type of brain tumour in 2019, at the age of 10. Eve said; “When I dance, everything kind of falls out of my mind. I just go to a whole different place.” Like and watch this video to find out what Eve’s dream is and with your support, you’ll help raise awareness this Childhood Cancer Awareness Month.

You can also watch Josh’s video here: “When I grow up, I want to be a photographer.”

You can also watch the behind the scenes video here.

Donate today

Childhood Cancer Conference

In previous years we’ve hosted our annual Childhood Cancer Conference throughout September. In 2019, the focus was an update on how genomic medicine is being used to deliver new therapies, reduce toxicity, enable early diagnosis and progress efforts to prevent cancer in children, teenagers and young adults. Read about our 2019 Conference here.

Our 2018 conference brought together leading research scientists from across the world to discuss advances in Precision Medicine, and how it can be used to treat children and young people with cancer. Read about our 2018 Conference here.

Golden moments

In 2017, for Childhood Cancer Awareness Month we celebrated the positive impact of research in childhood and young person’s cancer by asking families to share their ‘Golden Moments’ from their child’s cancer journey. These moments are memories that will never be lost and show that even in difficult circumstances hope is a force for good.

See the Golden Moments