The Obama administration is launching a new effort to cure cancer, reminding back to the time of the race into space.
"It probably won't be cured in my lifetime, but I think it'll be cured in yours." As President Barack Obama explained to a 4th-grader in Baton Rouge, maybe cancer won't be cured in his lifetime but it could be cured in student's lifetime.
In the recent years, there has been striking progress even though cancer remains America's number two killer. The American Cancer Society predicts there will be more than 595,000 deaths from cancer and nearly 1.7 million new cancer cases this year.
Vice President Joe Biden was assigned by President Obama to figure out how to speed that progress. Topping Biden's wish list is getting scientists to better share research data and increased research funding.
Since its peak in 1991, the death rate from cancer is dropping by 23 percent. This is the result of many improvements in detection and treatment of the most common cancers, including prostate, breast, lung and colorectal. Drops in smoking rate also had a positive effect on lung cancer rate.
Another significant progress is the fact that the five-year survival rates for most cancers are increasing. For instance, nowadays, the five years survival rate for breast cancer is now 89 percent and more than 90 percent for thyroid and prostate cancers.
Over two-thirds of patients survive at least five years with lymphoma, uterine, cervical, colorectal and kidney cancers. The best survival rate can be ensured by discovering cancer before it spreads.
The American Cancer Society's chief medical officer, Dr. Otis Brawley, warns that will not be possible to find a cure for cancer very soon. Also, as reported by The Washington Post, Brawley added that since cancer isn't one disease but hundreds, there will not be just a single cure.
The good news is that scientists are not starting to understand more about the mechanisms of developing cancers as well as how it spreads in the body. This creates hopes for finding new ways to treat it, according to CNN.
