Each year, non-profit organizations team with the general public to raise money for a global act of kindness toward a long list of activist movements. This annual global generosity movement is called “Giving Tuesday,” the day when donating to non-profit organizations is most amplified.

One of the most powerful Giving Tuesday causes is the fight to cure cancer. ACGT’s vision is a cancer-free future, and we believe developing cancer cell and gene therapies is the path to build this future, evident by five new therapies approved to treat blood cancers since 2017. Not only do these therapies sidestep many of the side effects caused by traditional cancer treatments like chemotherapy and radiation, but they’re also proven to prolong survival far beyond the standard of care and lead to higher remission rates.

Our next challenge is to have this same curative impact on solid tumor malignancies, such as pancreatic cancer and glioblastoma (a type of brain cancer). However, we need your help. It’s a massive mountain to scale, but it’s one we can scale with generosity from people like you.

What Giving Tuesday means for ACGT.

The lifeblood of ACGT is gift-giving, and Giving Tuesday is the day when public consciousness turns in full force toward donating to non-profit organizations. In the cancer research community, Giving Tuesday is integral in helping us take the next steps toward our goal.

Donations ensure we can fund the necessary research and studies to prove cell and gene therapy is a breakthrough against cancer. Without your generosity, we couldn’t have advanced CAR-T therapies for blood cancers.

Without our donors:

• The studies that proved the potential of CAR T-cell therapies to cure cancer may never have gotten off the ground.
• Some of the inspiring cancer survivors who benefited from cancer cell and gene therapy might not be alive today.

So Giving Tuesday is, in short, a moment for all of us to take a gigantic leap forward toward a cancer-free future. There are many doctors and researchers in our field performing impressive work to kill tumors. Their ideas deserve funding, as do the cancer patients who could benefit from their work.

There are hundreds, if not thousands, of deserving organizations with Giving Tuesday fundraising campaigns. If curing cancer is on your list, join ACGT’s mission for a cancer-free future by making a donation.

Here are five other reasons you should consider donating to our Alliance against cancer.

1. 100% of donations go to research funding.

One of the features setting Alliance for Cancer Gene Therapy apart is how much of your donation goes to research. The answer? All of it.

Every dollar you send us goes directly to supporting breakthrough studies into T-cell therapies and similar concepts. Over the last 20 years, we’ve raised more than $34 million, all of it going to scientists trying to uncover a cure for cancer. This has led to 63 research fellows and 67 research grants from ACGT spanning 38 of the best medical institutions. Some of the cancer centers we’re currently working with include:

• Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai Hospital 
• Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Institute 
• Yale University School of Medicine 
• University of Pennsylvania Abramson Cancer Center 
• University of California San Francisco 

These are just some of the very best cancer institutions in our country, and your donation allows us to collaborate with them – and with you!

2. Proof of concept: 5 therapies approved for blood cancers.

Alliance for Cancer Gene Therapy has already helped reach significant milestones in cancer cell and gene therapy. Our funding of early-phase research led to the first FDA-approved CAR T-cell therapy for blood cancer. 

The initial approval was in 2017, and today there are five drugs approved for either leukemia, lymphoma or multiple myeloma: 

• Kymriah (tisagenlecleucel)
• Yescarta (axicabtagene ciloleucel)
• Tecartus (brexucabtagene autoleucel)
• Breyanzi (lisocabtagene maraleucel)
• Abecma (idecabtagene vicleucel)

We believe these five approvals are just the beginning of cell and gene therapy changing the landscape of cancer treatment. Your donation is the way forward to test these therapies on other cancers.

3. Our Scientific Advisory Council.

There are a lot of research initiatives investigating improvements in cancer treatment. How do we at Alliance for Cancer Gene Therapy know which projects deserve funding? 

The answer to this question is another distinction setting ACGT apart from other organizations. Our Scientific Advisory Council consists of the most accomplished thought leaders in cancer cell and gene therapy. They bring expertise and vision to the funding process, ensuring your donation supports the research with the most promise to finding a cure.

4. Collaboration with partners.

Alliance for Cancer Gene Therapy understands the fight against cancer cannot be done by one person — or even one group. This is why we ask for donations from you and others. It’s why we created the Scientific Advisory Council to help determine which programs to bet on. 

It’s why we collaborate with peer organizations and leading biotech companies on groundbreaking cancer cell and gene therapy projects. These partnerships will hopefully lead to clinical breakthroughs much more quickly, and forge a collaborative path forward. 

5. Cryptocurrency donations now accepted by ACGT.

ACGT partners with The Giving Block, an organization helping non-profit agencies accept cryptocurrency donations. This provides potential donors with another gift-giving option. 

Donating cryptocurrency to the Alliance may provide tax benefits, as the IRS classifies cryptocurrencies as property. This means a cryptocurrency donation might be a non-taxable event, meaning you as a donor may not owe capital gains and can deduct it on your taxes. 

We recommend you always consult your qualified professional advisor(s) on how a gift to ACGT may affect your overall plans. You should also ask a professional about your eligibility for tax benefits from cryptocurrency donations.

The Giving Block allows us to accept the following cryptocurrencies: Bitcoin (BTC), Ethereum (ETH), Basic Attention Token (BAT), Aave (AAVE), Alchemix (ALCX), Amp (AMP), Ankr Network (ANKR), Balancer (BAL), Axie Infinity Shards (AXS), Bancor Network Token (BNT) and BarnBridge (BOND), among others.

We also offer the opportunity to donate in someone’s memory, as a tribute.

However you choose to donate, know you are helping in the fight against cancer.

The effort to find cures for cancer has lasted for decades, but we believe recent breakthroughs in cancer cell and gene therapy mean a cancer-free future isn’t too far away. Your gift on Giving Tuesday will help us get there in time to save many lives.