5K race raises $50K for ocular melanoma cluster awareness

HUNTERSVILLE, N.C. — Hundreds of people braved a dreary and drizzly Saturday morning to run a 5K race in hopes of helping solve a stubborn mystery.

Why has a rare eye cancer that normally strikes only five people out of a million hit Huntersville a dozen times?

"We have a lot of questions about what's going on here. It doesn't make sense to have so many people here with ocular melanoma and we want to find out why," said event organizer Melody King.

For a year and a half Eyewitness News has been investigating Huntersville's eye cancer cases and what may have caused them.

Patients have been consistently frustrated by state and local health officials who have said repeatedly they found nothing to indicate there's a cancer cluster. But two nationally known eye cancer researchers from Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia came to Huntersville Saturday.

Dr. Takami Sato and Dr. Marlana Orloff said they will use some of the nearly $50,000 volunteers raised in the 5K race to begin their own independent research.

"We all think what happened here in Huntersville is unique,” Orloff said. "I think it's really prompted us to think bigger."

Many people in the Huntersville community want to know more, as well. At an afternoon public meeting centering on the ocular melanoma cases Dr. Randall Williams, deputy secretary at NC DHHS at NC DHHS said he plans to work to create a new registry to better track ocular melanoma cases in Huntersville and across the state.

It’s what Huntersville Commissioner Rob Kidwell, who put the meeting together, was hoping to hear.

"As long as we keep moving forward and asking questions and keep putting pressure on the state and county I think we'll get there eventually," Kidwell said.

Organizers told Channel 9 that $50,000 was raised at Saturday's race.

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