Private sources, such as the Hyundai car company, are trying to change that - putting Hope on Wheels.
At first, Grayson Voytek seemed to have a virus. A COVID test was negative, but a doctor ordered a chest X-ray just to be sure.
"In the chest x-ray, his whole left chest was full of a mass. So we were completely blindsided," recalls his mother, Kristy Voytek.
Within hours, Grayson and his parents were at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia, where he was diagnosed with T-cell lymphoma. Kristy says it came out of nowhere, but was growing fast.
"It was absolutely collapsing his heart and lungs," she explained.
Just shy of his 10th birthday, Grayson began a grueling two year treatment regimen.
There's a 90% survival rate for newly-diagnosed cases like his, but: "T-cell disease is harder to treat at the time of relapse," says Dr. Haley Newman, an attending physician and researcher at Children's Hospital.
Dr. Newman has received a $300,000 grant from the Hyundai Hope on Wheels foundation to better predict who might relapse and whether the initial treatment can be adjusted to prevent that.
Hyundai is donating $27 million dollars for this 27th year of Hope on Wheels. Since the start, the parent company and 850 dealers have invested $277 million dollars.
"These kids deserve the cure. They didn't do anything wrong," says Burns Hyundai President Peter Lanzavecchia. "They didn't smoke for 50 years, they didn't have decades of exposure to toxins. They're just innocent little kids that had some bad luck."
Dr. Newman says new drug treatments are needed, to better target the cancer - and spare children from side effects.
"Cardiac toxicity, endocrine toxicity, growth changes, developmental changes," are among the most frequent ones, she says, but there many more.
Some side effects last a few months, some last a lifetime.
Grayson's mom says adults get less drastic treatments now, and kids deserve them too.
"To know that she might be able to pinpoint something that could prevent another child getting the complications that Grayson's endured, that means a lot," Kristy explains.
Hope on Wheels is now supporting research on survivorship, along with the search for cures. Survivorships programs help kids like Grayson long after treatment.
Anyone can donate to the cause at HyundaiHopeonWheels.org.