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It's a well known fact that current cancer treatments are still crude, non-specific and limited in effectiveness. Because it is a genetic, molecular and cell biology disease, of fundamental failures of the cell cycle, uncontrolled proliferation, due to critical failures at the lowest levels of function.
The mainstays of treatment - surgery, radiation and chemotherapy, only remove a fraction of these cancerous cells, even a large fraction in many cases, but leave enough behind that the disease recurs. Only a small fraction of cancer types can be essentially cured today, some skin cancers and prostate, thyroid, due to their unique features.
The total solution is to perfect the new emerging treatments which work at the level of basic cellular function. Gene therapy, immunotherapy, vaccines, viral therapy, adoptive cell therapies, CRISPR/Cas9 - these are the promising technologies with the potential for totally eradicating cancers in general.
We are at a turning point in the fight for a complete defeat of cancer, but the task is very detailed, intensive lab work, requiring massive increases in funding for the basic research, the translational technologies, clinical trials, etc.
Current NCI funding for cancer research is only around $5 Billion/year, which may sound like a lot, but is totally dwarfed by the $700 Billion the US spends on its military. That's less than one percent. Just look at the cost-effectiveness of this misappropriation of funds - Millions of Americans are diagnosed with cancer each year, most of whom will die. Compare that to the "effectiveness" of the massive military spending over the past half century. What useful result has come from all these wars we got involved in? Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan. How did this help save American lives? Has it made the world a better place? How does maintaining thousands of nuclear warheads, huge carrier battle groups roaming all the seas, hundreds of foreign military bases, really help save American lives?
Maybe based on some political theories or another, but we cannot hide the truth that half a million Americans die of cancer each year, with their families and loved ones suffering such senseless losses. These are the facts. We need to get serious and real about solving it.
The direct solution is to force our Congress to wake up, from the grass-roots constituents level, and slash military funding sufficiently to bring NCI cancer research funding up to par - about a 50% cut to DoD. We must make this urgency sufficiently known to our representatives, so this major realignment of funding can be done right now, to cure cancer once and for all, for ourselves and the future generations.
It's a well known fact that current cancer treatments are still crude, non-specific and limited in effectiveness. Because it is a genetic, molecular and cell biology disease, of fundamental failures of the cell cycle, uncontrolled proliferation, due to critical failures at the lowest levels of function.
The mainstays of treatment - surgery, radiation and chemotherapy, only remove a fraction of these cancerous cells, even a large fraction in many cases, but leave enough behind that the disease recurs. Only a small fraction of cancer types can be essentially cured today, some skin cancers and prostate, thyroid, due to their unique features.
The total solution is to perfect the new emerging treatments which work at the level of basic cellular function. Gene therapy, immunotherapy, vaccines, viral therapy, adoptive cell therapies, CRISPR/Cas9 - these are the promising technologies with the potential for totally eradicating cancers in general.
We are at a turning point in the fight for a complete defeat of cancer, but the task is very detailed, intensive lab work, requiring massive increases in funding for the basic research, the translational technologies, clinical trials, etc.
Current NCI funding for cancer research is only around $5 Billion/year, which may sound like a lot, but is totally dwarfed by the $700 Billion the US spends on its military. That's less than one percent. Just look at the cost-effectiveness of this misappropriation of funds - Millions of Americans are diagnosed with cancer each year, most of whom will die. Compare that to the "effectiveness" of the massive military spending over the past half century. What useful result has come from all these wars we got involved in? Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan. How did this help save American lives? Has it made the world a better place? How does maintaining thousands of nuclear warheads, huge carrier battle groups roaming all the seas, hundreds of foreign military bases, really help save American lives?
Maybe based on some political theories or another, but we cannot hide the truth that half a million Americans die of cancer each year, with their families and loved ones suffering such senseless losses. These are the facts. We need to get serious and real about solving it.
The direct solution is to force our Congress to wake up, from the grass-roots constituents level, and slash military funding sufficiently to bring NCI cancer research funding up to par - about a 50% cut to DoD. We must make this urgency sufficiently known to our representatives, so this major realignment of funding can be done right now, to cure cancer once and for all, for ourselves and the future generations.
Let's make this happen.
You left out hematologic cancers, many of which, including childhood leukemia, have excellent cure rates. Solid tumors are harder but there are millions of survivors of those, too, who will ultimately die of something other than their cancers.
The US cancer death rate has dropped 27% in 25 years.
I agree that it would be lovely to direct more of the DoD budget to health (not just cancer) research.
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