Cure for Cancer Found, Apparently

[MRevelle83]

Sorry that I don't have a link as I posted this right after seeing it on the news. Probably BS, but I don't know if anyone else has heard of it- but I also didn't see the whole report, so whatever.

Anyway the report said they (researchers from somewhere I didn't hear the name of) found what appears to be a cure for cancer, extracted from bees in some way. Rats that had cancer, along with malignant tumors, were injected with this cure and supposedly both the growths and cancer were eradicated.

A woman with cancer being interviewed was given about 1 year to live and yet, they would not give her the treatment.

Because it is not FDA approved.

Which takes 5 years. So yeah.

So, what do you all think? BS? Cancer cure found but not marketed as it means loss in money for the people 'curing' us? What do you think?

And anyone have a proper link?

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/lif...cle6790927.ece
Here's one article, which is sort of old.

[Red Dragon]

Re: Cure for Cancer Found, Apparently

No money in finding cures, just treatments, so probably BS.

[Karr Lord of Chaos]

Re: Cure for Cancer Found, Apparently

far too preliminary, also i dont think that a single "cure" could be used for all cancer types. that there is nothing in the way of any evidence is also suspect.

[Hrafn]

Re: Cure for Cancer Found, Apparently

How many years have we heard different variations on this story? It's hard not to be skeptical by this point.

[Kire]

Re: Cure for Cancer Found, Apparently

People should be able to take whatever treatments they want, especially when they've run out of options. The worst that can happen is they die, which will prolly happen anyway.

[John Mora]

Re: Cure for Cancer Found, Apparently

It's still absolutely unethical, in my opinion. You have NO idea what's gonna happen to someone if you give it to them, or what a proper dosage would be, if no proper trials have been run. It'd be a shot in the dark with possibly horrific consequences, and the oath physicians take swears them to do no harm. Your solution may be pragmatic, but it's still wholly unethical.

[Sampson]

Re: Cure for Cancer Found, Apparently

It's still absolutely unethical, in my opinion. You have NO idea what's gonna happen to someone if you give it to them, or what a proper dosage would be, if no proper trials have been run. It'd be a shot in the dark with possibly horrific consequences, and the oath physicians take swears them to do no harm. Your solution may be pragmatic, but it's still wholly unethical.

The "oath" is really an archiac BS formality.

Anyway, I found more unethical to deny someone the treatment if they want it. If you explain that its risky and untested, and they still wish to try it, how is it unethical to violate their wishes?

[Red Dragon]

Re: Cure for Cancer Found, Apparently

It's just so they don't get sued really.

[Perversion]

Re: Cure for Cancer Found, Apparently

Don't like to get into these discussions too much, but I will, as devil's advocate, throw the name Dr. Kevorkian out there...

[John Mora]

Re: Cure for Cancer Found, Apparently

The "oath" is really an archiac BS formality.

Anyway, I found more unethical to deny someone the treatment if they want it. If you explain that its risky and untested, and they still wish to try it, how is it unethical to violate their wishes?

I feel I explained that in my post, but since you disagree, whatever. And then there's the distinction between ethics and morals. You could maybe make an argument that it's immoral. Although I'd still disagree.

[DarkwingChuck]

Re: Cure for Cancer Found, Apparently

The "do no harm" thing actually isn't in the Hippocratic oath. It used to include "try to avoid harming them" but that was taken out of the current version of the oath.

Patients near-death have a good chance of getting into the clinical trials. I mean they will HAVE to test it on human patients at some point or it could never get approved at all. Regardless, the FDA has a horrible track record when it comes to serving the public good. They're "risk vs gain" philosophy usually leads to them choosing not to recall profitable drugs that have turned out to be harmful enough to be recalled in other countries, but instead put stricter warnings on the label.

[IamPinhead]

Re: Cure for Cancer Found, Apparently

Well, if there really is a cure for cancer, and it works on humans, the head of every insurance company who denies any cancer patient will be strung up by their balls in the street. I hope.
If we didn't trust treatment based on animal testing, people would still have polio and we would not have streptomycin.
If the woman is dying a slow painful death over the course of a year, what's wrong with giving her treatment proven to cure cancer in an animal frequently used for testing?
The problem I see here is not giving the treatment, or in doing so providing false hope without proper evidence.
Also, "Ratchet and Clank: Size Matters" blows hardcore.

[Jehuty]

Re: Cure for Cancer Found, Apparently

There will never be a 'cure' for cancer, because cancer is not a disease in the traditional sense. The causes are too varied, the pathways, too complex. Many people acknowledge that prevention and screening are the best methods to annihilate cancer, but its a hard to sell plan thanks to the billions of dollars a drug company can make by altering a single carboxyl group on a naturally occurring compound and patenting it.

Also, no singular treatment will ever work on every single cancer. Cancer is as variable as humanity is itself. For instance, ER2 positive breast cancer patients are eligible for several effective treatments and preventive practices that are completely useless for HNPCC patients, and actually harmful for uterine cancer patients.

As someone who actually works in the field, FDA(and analogous regulatory bodies) is a double-edged sword. They're woefully behind as a regulatory body(Epigenetic research is in full swing, and they haven't even acknowledged its existence yet), but still an important asset to ensure that treatments are effective and ethical. The biggest mistake the government has ever done, was allow the patenting of biological and bioactive molecules.

Edit: As for 'letting dying patients take what they want to', its a bad idea. People in that position are as greedy as they are desperate.

Edit 2: Times is a HORRIBLE source for scientific articles, and are prone to sensationalist articles.

[orius]

Re: Cure for Cancer Found, Apparently

I call BS. Cancer isn't a single disease, it's a blanket term for a lot of very harmful genetic problems.

You might be able to cure one form of cancer, but it necessarily (and likely probably) wouldn't affect other cancers. Likely, this might be a cure found for one form of cancer and some journalist just conflated it into cancer in general.