ROCKLAND — Every two minutes, a child is diagnosed with cancer. The Maine Children’s Cancer Program held a walk for at five locations across Maine simultaneously Saturday, September 17. Locally, walkers assembled at South School in Rockland and all the walks were to begin the three-mile course at the same time.

Barbara Guy, who coordinated the MCCP walk for Knox County, said the money raised will stay in this area to support research and services.

“Our goal is to hopefully find a cure for childhood cancer,” she said. “The money raised goes to support research and social services. When kids are struck with cancer it not only affects the kids, but the whole family. This helps pay for a social worker to help that family deal with the illness.”

Guy said the walk is held once a year and that this is the second year the event has been held for Rockland.

Gail Lenfestey, of Warren, was at the walk and said her son was in the program 25 years ago.

“He’s a survivor and he’s 38 now,” she said. “I didn’t know the walk was happening until I turned on the news this morning, and I just said I’m going to go walk. This is my first time to walk even though we were part of this program so long ago.”

Lenfesty said cancer attacks every member of the family in a different way.

“It’s everything,” she said. “It affecrs every person in the family. We had a nurse tell us that this would either make us, or break us and we decided it was going to make us as a family. You think as a mother, how could I have prevented this, what could I have done differently, and there really isn’t anything you could have done.”

Kathleen Leach, of South Thomaston, was walking Saturday with a team of people she works with at Pen Bay Medical Center.

“One of the women I’m walking with, her grandson had cancer,” she said. “We’ve been walking with Make-a-Wish and this is our first year with this program, but it’s a great cause and we’re happy to do it.”

Leach said that children’s cancer research is underfunded in the U.S.

“It only gets 10 percent of all the cancer funding,” she said. “It’s really important that people are aware of that. And something like this helps people understand how important children’s cancer research is.”

Childhood cancer is the leading cause of death among children under 15 in the U.S.