Congressman Chris Smith addressed runners and walkers at the "Pound the Pavement for Purple" event in Monmouth County, N.J. to fight pancreatic cancer, held on the Columbus Day Holiday Weekend in Neptune.

"All these volunteers and organizers of this event know how deadly pancreatic  cancer is," Smith said. "Events like this help support awareness, funding and research and give hope to patients and their families that one day there will be better treatments for pancreatic cancer."

Smith spoke about federal efforts to combat pancreatic cancer. He noted that 90 percent of pancreatic cancer cases are diagnosed after the cancer has begun to spread—and those have an exceedingly low survival rate, with just 7.5 percent of patients living for more than five years after a diagnosis. Over nine percent of patients are diagnosed when the cancer is still localized and the survival rate is 29 percent for those patients after five years. 

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), pancreatic cancer is one of the 10 most common forms of cancer and accounts for seven percent of all cancer deaths. Unfortunately, pancreatic cancer is difficult to detect early and individuals may have no or vague symptoms initially. Found in its advanced stages, pancreatic cancer is difficult to treat.

The National Cancer Institute (NCI), part if the National Institutes for Health (NIH), estimates that 53,070 people will be diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2016 and that 41,780 people will die of it.

In March 2013, Rep. Smith joined with like-minded colleagues in urging the House Appropriations Committee to include pancreatic cancer as an eligible research category in the Peer Reviewed Cancer Research Program in the Department of Defense (DOD). DOD  conducts high-impact innovative research through the PRCRP that has been used to improve early detection of pancreatic cancer, to better understand the prognosis of pancreatic cancer patients, and to improve the well-being of individuals with a pancreatic cancer diagnosis.

The Consolidated Appropriations Act for Fiscal Year (FY) 2016—increases funding for NIH from $30 billion to $32 billion for FY 2016.

"This $2 billion boost represents the largest increase the agency has received in 12 years," Smith said. "We have to push ahead and dedicate as much resources in this fight as possible."

In FY2015 pancreatic cancer research at NIH received $174 million and is projected to receive a total of $181 million for FY 2016.

The event on Saturday in Neptune raised about $42,000, the most ever, according to one of the co-founders of the run, Monmouth County Freeholder Tom Arnone.