What is preventing American scientists and doctors to find a cure for cancer?

Question

Americans have lead the world in many different areas of successful research into medical conditions. The funding that people have spent on cancer has been increasing so what is the problem?

Answer 1

MONEY
many people already know how to take care of cancer properly so they can have a better quality of life even IF it doesn't put theirs in remission. The drug companies fight it and call it quack because they want the money they make off it. Look at the teenager in Virginia last summer, the court ordered him to go to the doctor and not do the alternative. At least the court could have told him he could do the alternative supplements and diet with the doctor monitoring his progress and adding any necessary medical help as needed. They didn't so that proves to me they are trying to hide something.

Also unfortunately many people when they do seek alternatives for cancer they only do particial because they do not study the full
extent of possibilities so they might only do polyphenol and essaic and not know they also need to take Q10 with shark cartiledge, chinese and native american herbs and other things along with a good diet.

Answer 2

First of all there will never be "a cure for cancer". To understand this, you need to understand that there are MANY different forms of cancer and no one cure could take care of them all.

Second, most cancers occur naturally in the body. Cancer is our own cells becoming mutated and spreading rapidly. What you are suggesting is for scientists to "play God" not come up with a cure.

Thirdly, there have been MANY advancements in cancer treatments over the past 30 years or so. If people would do research rather than rail on and on about the government not doing anything about it, they would see this fact.

I am a Hodgkin's lymphoma patient. Thirty years ago, survival rates for my cancer were probably about 40%, today they are 85% or better and it can be classed as "cured" not simply "in remission". Treatments of most cancers today are less invasive and procedures like bone marrow transplants have helped make patients that would have once been terminal, now have a good shot at living fairly normal cancer-free lives.

The facts are, there HAS been great advancements in cancer study and research. Cancer deaths have been on a great decline over the past few decades and treatments are much easier on people today than ever before. We don't have that "miracle" cure, but if you would take time to do some research you would see just how much cancer treatments/remissions and cures have grown in leaps and bounds.

If a "cure all" is what you want, you should be talking to magical fairies, not the government or medical researchers...because it's just not going to happen the way you are suggesting. That's the cold hard reality of life.

Answer 3

Some cancers can be cured, others can be taken into remission. Cancers are different types of virus's and a lot is being done to find a cure. The "conservatives" stymie research, by not letting the research with stem cell to go full steam ahead. A friend of mine who has multiple myeloma (which can't be cured) went to Duke University and had stem cell treatment and is doing very well. The life expectancy of someone with multiple myeloma is about 3-9 years. Is the fertilizing of human eggs in a petri dish something of God, or has science gone too far? If you believe in human embros being fertilized in a peti dish and someone give birth that way, you should believe in stem cell use in science as well!

Answer 4

Just an inside view people:

1- In recent years, government funding, for all research, has decreased drastically in Canada and US at least. When my institute's researchers had 80-85% success rate in grant application before, this years it has been 15% (fortunately, my director is one of 2 lucky ones...). Many very reknown researchers have been denied funding in recent years... Cost, direct or inderect, of the ludicrously costly war in Iraq.

2- Most researcher are turning to private funding from pharmas... Not highly successfully either. This sector is not very healthy either, since the highly publicised failures of some new star medications like Vioxx... And when you turn to private funding, you have to sign some confidentiality agreements denying your right to publish anything without the pharma's consent (for patenting purposes).... Tends to slow down research.

Science is also unfortunately cursed with politics... And there is also the fact that cancer research is not easy, nor cheap.

Answer 5

cancer is an umbrella term for many diseases that start with funky cells gowing crazy and multiplying and making tumors. Every kind of cancer is completely different. The problem with cancer is not finding the cure. it is finding the cause. If they can figure out exactly how it is caused and why, they could learn to reverse the process. All they know is that it is a gentic malfunction in one cell that starts to multiply. This can be caused by radiation some other know things like smoking. But exactly how and why, they do not know.

Answer 6

First of all: There has been progress made. Overall death from cancers has fallen steadily due to new innovations in medicine and diagnosis.

Cancer acts very differently from any other disease, it really only fits into the category of a disease because we don't know where else to put it. It is the result of our own cells going haywire (bunches of these cells are what make up tumors) and tumors are easy to kill, but because cancerous cells are so similar to regular cells, the hard part is targeting just the cancerous region.

There will be no miracle "cure for cancer," but rest assured, the millions of dollars that have already gone to cancer research have saved many lives and will save more.

Answer 7

This question pops up regularly on Yahoo Answers. Your question is far too simplistic to answer. Cancer is not one disease but over 200 that is complicated by grade and stage, not to mention each individuals age, overall health, and response to treatment. There is not one cure all for cancer, but there are many types of treatments and cures for many different types of cancer.

And, I do not know where you got the idea that funding for cancer is increasing. It is not. Funding is being cut by the US government, in particular, funding for the National Cancer Institute which means many cancer research projects will be eliminated.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/01/25/eveningnews/main2400032.shtml?CMP=ILC-SearchStories

Instead of focusing on questions like this, people should be outraged that cancer research funding is being cut. I am disgusted.

"President Bush wants to cut the funding for the second year in a row — this time by $40 million."

Answer 8

Many cures for cancer have been found. The main problem is that there is no single cause of cancer- some cancers are caused by viruses, others by radiation, others by chemicals (eg. smoke, rubber) others by physical irritation (eg. asbesthos), others due to genetic factors, or by a combination of several factors, still others by factors unknown.
For example we know that some stomach ulcers turn into carcinomas. We know that some locations of these ulcers are more likely places for them to turn into cancer- but WHY?
Why some smokers end up with carcinoma, others with obstructive lung disease, still others get no lung cancer but get stomach tumours, and still others have no problems whatsoever?

The best answer might be that "cancer" is not a single disease, but a simply a characteristic symptom of very many completely different illnesses- and we are still at the stage of trying to identify what illnesses they might be.

Answer 9

I hate this! I've known so many that have died from Cancer. I am like you, I can't understand why there are not bigger advances in this field.

Unfortunately, I believe a lot of it is money. I know they receive a good amount, but because of our govenments pirorities, I doubt they get what they so desperatley need.

Maybe one day this nation will have someone in office who understands that we have bigger issues to face and bigger wars to fight.

If you follow history closely you notice that with every great success there had to be an even worse disaster. I feel that Cancer will not get the attention it deserves until someone extremely rich and powerful gets it or a loved one of theirs, and then it will matter to them and so will be the end of this disease.

Answer 10

There are probably lots of natural cures or even synthetic cures for all types of cancer and other illnesses but the drug industry along with doctors do not really want to cure everything because they'd lose out on a lot of money, wouldn't they ? They are in the business to make money and if it means keeping people sick, they'll not think twice about witholding known cures for cancer. I believe this to be true in lots of instances. More than we know.