War On Cancer

12 Pages 2931 Words

causes people who have inherited normal genes - the majority of the population - to develop gene defects that eventually lead to cancer. The answer is complicated by the nature of cancer. Cancer, in a sense, is not one disease but scores of different diseases that share the common feature of uncontrolled cell growth. (Advances in Cancer Research)
Even though no cure has been found, has the scientific community been successful in their search for the cure? The answer: yes, no matter how one gauges the progress. Some prefer a broad measure and include not only the stark statistics about life and death but also gains in scientific knowledge that may affect those statistics in the future. And some of the gains have been spectacular, according to the National Cancer Institute (Advances in Cancer Research).
In a 1993 report, “Measures of Progress Against Cancer,” the NCI cited such benchmarks as the revolution in understanding how cells grow and die; development of the astonishing ability to identify specific cancer genes; advances in th...