Can we cure cancer by making it a cash prize?

Question

Everyone (and all nations) has been touched by cancer in some way. If all goverments add money to a prize-pool and then make that prize available to the first person/team to cure cancer completely, would that work? This could work just like the Ansari space prize. However - the catch - the cure MUST be made available free for all who would need it (and in the public domain). No patents and such! Truly free. Man gets motivated by a prize, competes for it - in a race! The prize could be yours, maybe even in the billions of dollars! Do you think that will inspire/motivate people to get involved? Would that work?
We need to do SOMETHING to get it moving along quicker...
I dream of a world free of cancer

Answer 1

Cancer is really 180+ diseases under the same name. Different types of cancer that affect different organs can and do have a different Mode Of Action (MOA) in many cases. As with many diseases a complete and total cure is not at hand.

1000's of scientists have wrote research papers, 1000's of experiments done, and great progress has been made. You are likely to be living 5 years from now if you are told "you have cancer". Thirty years ago most told the same thing died within 5 years.

As one scientist said sometime ago: "you will not be walking down the street some day and read a headline that says --scientists find cure for cancer--". Rather we will chip away at it slow but sure". It is impossible to cure 180 diseases all at once.

Other issues such as early detection will be just as important as cures for this disease. The problem with cancer is that most of the time when symptoms appear for the first time it has already spread. This is why it is important to educate the public to be on the look out for early signs especially if someone has a family history of cancer.

If you recieved severe sunburn before age 18, have a dermatologist check your skin once a year. Women over 50 should have yearly mamograms. If you don't smoke, don't start. If you do smoke, try to quit.

Many of the treatments today, although not an outright cure, can make this disease manageable. I hope that in the near future better public education, early detection, and therapies that offer management of cancer will help in the fight.

Maybe I can summerize by saying that a complete and total cure is not a "one-shot" deal. Attacking cancer from several different angles sems the best idea at least for now. As for the long term future -- we can always hope.

Answer 2

Offering the money as a cash prise at the END of the research isn't going to be much motivation. What scientists need is money to do the research NOW. Research cost money.... and though it may be very very attractive to get a big lum sum at the end of the research, without sufficient funds now, the research can't be done. Asking scientists to do research on borrowed funds in the hope that they will win the cash prize is just wishful thinking. That's like asking you to go into dept to buy a house in the middle of a desert in the hope that an oasis will suddenly appear at the site. Will you do it?

As for no patents and such, that's highly possible. Just give researches money to do research, with the condition of no patents, and they will do it!! Patents and copyrights are just a way for the companies who funded the research to get back the money they have invested (and a little bit more). If you start a foundation which provides grants to scientists with the condition of no patents, then the researcher will have to abide by that rule.

I'll look forward to a foundation set up by you to provide funds to cancer researches =) good luck!

Answer 3

There are already civilizations that are virtually cancer free. The incidence of cancer seems to be quite high in industrialized countries and practically non-existent in many rural communities... particularly Asian rural communities. Why, you might ask? Simple, better diet and lifestyle. Food processing, toxins, poor diet, and sedentary lifestyle in western civilizations have created a cash cow for doctors and big pharmaceuticals. Why, on earth, would they want a cure for cancer and all the other problems like diabetes, high blood pressure, and so forth? The health industry would go bankrupt if we all ate and lived like rural Asian folks where most are living well past 80 and into their hundreds. If you really want to do something helpful, just spread the truth about food and lifestyle....

Answer 4

I already have the cure for cancer. It probably can't cure everyone, but I believe that it could cure most people. It is FREE! But do you think people are breaking down my door begging me to tell them what the cure is? NO. It is really weird, even though I cured my cancer, so I know that it works, and have seen it mentioned in the medical journals, and I am a research scientist that understands what it all means, my oncologist said "I don't believe it, I don't want to hear about it." That pretty well sums up the response I get. I am really beginning to think people don't want a cure for cancer.

Answer 5

Cancer is NOT ONE DISEASE - there are hundreds of different types of cancer and variations within the same "type" of cancer.
For example, not all breast cancers behave the same.
Some respond to hormonal therapy and some do not.
Some grow relatively quickly, and some can be relatively slow to progress. The same is true for prostate cancer and others.
Lung cancers of various types are completely unlike leukemias or primary brain malignancies. To find "A" cure for all cancer is like trying to find one antibiotic that works for all the organisms that can cause infections: bacterial, viral, fungal, protozoal, etc.
What you will see are slow advances made in treating different types of cancer - some of which ARE curable with available treatments. The trouble is that the most common malignancies, such as most cases of lung cancer, are not curable if there has been spread of disease before diagnosis. Since a tumor mass containing one billion cancer cells may be roughly the size of a marble, it is simply impossible to "see" small early tumors containing only thousands of cells. If we could "see" microscopic cancers as they develop, we might
be able to "nip them in the bud" before they spread to other
areas of the body.
Work is ongoing to FIND CANCERS EARLIER.
If we want to see a marked decline in cancer deaths, the
single most effective remedy would be for all cigarette smokers to stop smoking. In about twenty years the cancer death rate would decline amazingly.
RC MD - - cancer specialist (retired)

Answer 6

I doubt that a cash prize would make any difference. Many scientists are working hard to find a cure but they do it because of real committment to the cause and for the recognition it would bring them...;

Answer 7

How about we funnel all of the money that goes to the lobby groups in Washington into medical research? Then instead of having all of these rich politicians, we have well-funded research.

Cash prizes only create arrogance and corruption.

Answer 8

there are a number of varieties of maximum cancers led to with the aid of particularly some issues and that they are all going to take diverse treatments. If somebody got here across a miracle scientific care that killed all varieties of maximum cancers, then confident, yet I doubt which will ensue.

Answer 9

I think it's a wonderful idea (no sarcasm).
But the problem is, how would all who compete get the funding for their reaserch and how would you motivate the countries to participate in it? Most countries would rather invest in nuclear research than invest in people's lives.
A sad fact.

Answer 10

Foolish dream and pointless. A cure would not come about due to some prize it would come about because someone had found the cure and wanted to help mankind.