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Our Annual Report
2000 Highlights
Letter from
the Postmaster General/CEO
2000 Year
in Review
Delivering
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The Governors
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2000 Annual Report
- page 10 of 70
Raising Awareness
Funds raised, causes
supported
Each day, we are touched in some way by the content
of our mail. Letters from home, sale flyers from our favorite department
stores—the mail binds our nation together with each message that
it brings. With it also come the hopes of millions of people carried
upon a single thumb-sized symbol that clings to the outside of most
envelopes. It’s a U.S. postage stamp.
World peace, adoption, energy conservation, hunger, AIDS awareness—postage
stamps have helped raise awareness of health and social issues for
more than 60 years. Organ and tissue donation, hospice care, the
loving act of adoption—it’s a proud tradition, one that you’ve been
a part of every time you purchased one of these postage stamps.
In 1998, the Postal Service issued our nation’s first ever semi-postal
stamp, created to call attention to a disease that threatens the
lives of hundreds of thousands of women each year—breast cancer.
The Breast Cancer Research (BCR) semi-postal stamp was the first
in our history to have its net proceeds above the cost of postage
earmarked for research.
It’s a worthy cause. And we’re serious about funding the fight to
find a cure. Our partners, American Express, Kaiser Permanente,
Lifetime Television, Revlon, the Women’s Information Network Against
Breast Cancer, and the Women’s National Basketball Association are
all equally dedicated, giving time and resources to promote the
stamp and build awareness.
The BCR semi-postal stamp is valid as postage at the current First-Class
rate. It sells for 40 cents with up to seven cents per stamp going
to research organizations—the National Institutes of Health and
the Medical Program of the Department of Defense.
Two years of sales raised $16.8 million in voluntary contributions
with $8.2 million raised in fiscal year 2000. The Postal Service
has recovered approximately $500,000 in costs related to the first
two years of the program.
In promoting the BCR semi-postal stamp we’ve learned a few lessons—the
relevance of preventative health care, the value of early detection
and the wisdom of getting a mammogram. We’re working to share these
lessons with the American public. Put into action, they may save
more lives than any amount of money ever could. Already, 2.6 million
women live with breast cancer. They are depending on us to help
fund the fight to find a cure. We’ll keep trying.
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