JointHealth™ express April 26, 2017
Cassie and Friends needs your voice for the upcoming BC 2017 Election
Calling on the BC Government to save and change the lives of children living with systemic juvenile idiopathic arthritis.
Juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) affects 24,000 infants to teens in BC and Canada, or 3 in every 1,000, making it one of the most common causes of chronic disability in children. Ten to 20 percent of children living with JIA have systemic juvenile idiopathic arthritis (sJIA), a severe and potentially life-threatening form of the disease. Both JIA and sJIA can be devastating and come with high financial, family and societal burdens.
In partnership with Arthritis Consumer Experts, Cassie and Friends Society is leading a call for the BC Government to drastically improve the outlook of children with sJIA by allowing reimbursement coverage for canakinumab for children who need it. For children who do not respond to other treatments, canakinumab can prevent progression of the disease and disease symptoms.
Cassie and Friends is urging all parties running for public office in British Columbia to make juvenile arthritis and canakinumab reimbursement access a health priority during the upcoming provincial election on May 9. You can help by sharing your story or sending an email or letter to your candidate. Together, we can help improve the lives of children living with arthritis!
What can you do?
Cassie and Friends needs your voice for the upcoming BC 2017 Election
Calling on the BC Government to save and change the lives of children living with systemic juvenile idiopathic arthritis.
Juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) affects 24,000 infants to teens in BC and Canada, or 3 in every 1,000, making it one of the most common causes of chronic disability in children. Ten to 20 percent of children living with JIA have systemic juvenile idiopathic arthritis (sJIA), a severe and potentially life-threatening form of the disease. Both JIA and sJIA can be devastating and come with high financial, family and societal burdens.
In partnership with Arthritis Consumer Experts, Cassie and Friends Society is leading a call for the BC Government to drastically improve the outlook of children with sJIA by allowing reimbursement coverage for canakinumab for children who need it. For children who do not respond to other treatments, canakinumab can prevent progression of the disease and disease symptoms.
Cassie and Friends is urging all parties running for public office in British Columbia to make juvenile arthritis and canakinumab reimbursement access a health priority during the upcoming provincial election on May 9. You can help by sharing your story or sending an email or letter to your candidate. Together, we can help improve the lives of children living with arthritis!
What can you do?
- Write a letter to your candidate using this letter template.
- Send a meeting request to your candidate. Here is a simple guide to an effective candidate meeting created by Arthritis Consumer Experts.
- Learn more about the impact of juvenile arthritis on children and families in British Columbia. Share this JIA backgrounder with your local candidate.
- Use the hashtag #VoteJIA when you tweet about the election.
- Tweet or post on Facebook when you are attending a candidate event.
- Retweet Cassie and Friends’ tweets and share their Facebook messages about the election.
Arthritis Consumer Experts
ACE thanks Arthritis Research Canada (ARC) for its scientific review of ACE and JointHealth™ information and education programs.