Almost every one of us has either been diagnosed ourselves or had a relative diagnosed with cancer. I’ve been lucky enough to stay cancer free, but I’ve had several people close to me diagnosed with cancer. That diagnosis is often a death sentence. We’ve been hearing about a cure for cancer since I was in elementary school, so where is it?
First, I suppose we should acknowledge what cancer is. In very basic terms cancer is our own cells dividing uncontrollably. Our bodies are made up of about 100 trillion cells. These cells have a lifespan. To replace dead cells our living cells divide into two.
There is a lot going on inside any given cell, there are several moving parts, not to mention all of our DNA. Sometimes, during that division, an error can occur. This doesn’t happen all that often during cell division, but with 100 trillion cells in the body it happens enough.
Thankfully, our cells have a self-destruct mechanism built in so that if anything goes wrong during cell division the cell in error kills itself. But sometimes the error in the cell happens to affect the self-destruct mechanism so the cell doesn’t kill itself. In that case our body’s immune system should identify the cell as being in error and attack and kill the cell. Cancer happens when both systems fail. Cancer is a cell that keeps dividing itself even though it serves no purpose and our immune systems fail to recognize it as a problem and let it continue.
Cancer becomes a big problem if we fail to detect it early enough. If left unchecked eventually those cancerous cells break off and move to other parts of the body. I knew someone who had breast cancer but it spread to their bones and they died of that. The earlier we catch cancer the better the survival rates are.
But that’s with our current treatment options. Where is the actual cure for cancer? Well, there probably won’t be a single cure for cancer. There are many types of cells in our bodies and there are many types of cancer. Lung cancer is different from skin cancer, which is different from breast cancer, which is different from pancreatic cancer. Cancers often have different primary causes – too much sun in the case of skin cancer or smoking in the case of lung cancer (It’s important to note that these aren’t the only causes of these cancers — a person who never smokes could still get lung cancer).
Instead, we’re likely to see several cures for several different types of cancer. Often via a vaccine. We know that the Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) is one of the main causes of cervical cancer. By getting the vaccine you can protect yourself from it (yes, both men and women can get the vaccine, I have gotten it). But aside from that we’ve been able to use the incredible leaps in vaccine technology thanks to the great work done by our pharmaceutical companies on the COVID vaccine. They have already begun taking that work and using it as the base to deliver vaccines for various types of cancers. A vaccine for cancer works like any other vaccine, it teaches our immune system what to attack. In these cases the vaccine teaches our immune system to attack a very specific version of cancer.
So, it’s likely that for the next several decades we’ll keep seeing new cures for cancer as new vaccines get developed. A trial for a pancreatic cancer (very low survival rate) vaccine was just done and the results are promising (though it’s important to note that trials rarely make it to the market). The future of cancer treatment looks promising and I hope we’re all around to benefit from it.
— Jason Ogaard is a software engineer who formerly lived in Hutchinson. He welcomes your technology questions, and he’ll answer them in this place. Please send your questions to technobabble@hutchinsonleader.com.
