Why Ending Cancer as We Know It Is So Challenging

In recent years, certain politicians and groups of researchers have made a bigger push to try and end cancer as we know it. This includes a variety of sub goals, including better understanding the root causes of various cancers and improving diagnostics. 

Ultimately, the combination of these improvements are meant to reduce the total number of cancer deaths and eventually, eliminate cancer altogether.

However, ending cancer as we know it is extremely challenging, and in the opinion of some experts, downright impossible. Why is this the case?

The Many Types of Cancer

For starters, there are many, many different types of cancer, and they all function somewhat differently in the body. Cancer is a somewhat generalized term, referring to aberrant cell mutations that continuously reproduce. Some cancers are relatively mild, while others are aggressive. Some cancers are capable of being treated with a wide range of methods, while others are fatal and almost impossible to treat.

For example, take mesothelioma. Mesothelioma is a particularly rare and aggressive form of cancer that emerges in most cases as a result of asbestos exposure. Asbestos was commonly used in military applications for many years and is still used in some applications; that’s why many people diagnosed with mesothelioma are military veterans.

Mesothelioma behaves very differently than other types of cancers. It’s much rarer. It’s much deadlier. It spreads more rapidly. It’s also harder to notice, due to its natural latency period and the fact that many of its symptoms can go undetected for years.

Treating this type of cancer is much, much harder than treating other types of cancer. While we can control cancer rates and deaths here, through the control of asbestos itself, scientists are at a loss for how to even begin treating it effectively and reliably.

Also Read: Nihon University Advertises ‘Portable Breast Cancer Detector’

Individual Developments

It’s also important to note that cancer can look very different in different types of people. For example, some people with breast cancer enjoy a speedy and functionally permanent recovery after a few rounds of simple treatment. For other people, breast cancer can be fatal. Symptoms can present themselves in different ways, and at different levels of severity, and people respond to treatments in many different ways as well.

This is a multifaceted disease that can’t be easily simplified – and universal approaches can’t realistically be developed.

Prevention and Root Causes

It’s also very difficult to prevent cancer at a large scale, due to the sheer number of potential root causes that can trigger the development of cancer. If you read the news regularly, or if you read warning labels in California, you’ll have a suspicion that nearly everything causes cancer – and on some level, that intuition is correct. Too much of almost anything can be bad for your health.

Because of the nuances here, it’s hard to come up with clear standards and clear forms of communication that allow people to avoid major cancer risks. On top of that, new root causes of cancer are constantly being discovered and analyzed, further complicating an already complicated environment.

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The Costs and Problems of Screenings

Diagnosing cancer early is advantageous for several reasons. In the early stages, cancer is smaller and more manageable, making it treatable with a wider variety of methods. Also, if you catch cancer before it spreads, you can stop it from growing out of control.

However, there are some problems associated with preventative cancer screenings. At scale, they can be somewhat expensive. There’s already a labor shortage in the medical field, which means proactive cancer screenings could take away resources from other, more urgent matters. And on top of that, excessive screenings can lead to false diagnoses and treatments for people who don’t really need them.

Trials and the Weight of Evidence

There are also problems associated with developing new treatment methods and palliative techniques. The medical and pharmacological industries are highly regulated, and an abundance of evidence must be presented before any new method or technique is considered to be safe or effective. This can limit the options available to cancer patients and greatly increase the time it takes to bring new options to market.

Information and Communication 

A large part of the efforts in better understanding and treating cancer is providing information and communication to people who need it. However, this can be both expensive and challenging; how do you educate an entire population on these matters? Health and medical misinformation is also an issue, especially with the explosive growth of social media and increased reliance on influencers for health advice.

Everything we learn about cancer is valuable, and every effort to control and eliminate cancer is worthwhile. But we also need to be realistic and understand that cancer is a very complicated illness – and ending it is much harder than it seems.