'Huge' results raise hope for cancer breakthrough

[FluffyLunamoth]

Great. More people not dying on an already overpopulated planet. Lovely. That's totally what we need.
I find this to be nice news but I'm not sure if you're joking or if you seriously went out of your way to make seemingly positive news turn to totally negative ._.

Regardless, nice find TC.


I'm being serious. It may be cold, but it's the truth. We've overpopulated the planet we rely on to survive, and this news is no help to that. /shrug For the record, yeah, I've had a lot of family die to cancer. Great grandma...uncle...mom has cancer...grandpa may have cancer...all leads to the same thing, in the end, no matter how hard you try to avoid it.

QUOTE(shinkukage09 @ Aug 11 2011, 10:33 PM)

Great. More people not dying on an already overpopulated planet. Lovely. That's totally what we need.

What?!?


How would you feel if your close relative/friend contracts cancer or some disease and only have only x amount of time to live? Wouldn't you want to save them, if possible.

Been down that road already.

 

[Gh0sti]

zombie apocalypse here we come

 

[Jakob95]

Great. More people not dying on an already overpopulated planet. Lovely. That's totally what we need.
I find this to be nice news but I'm not sure if you're joking or if you seriously went out of your way to make seemingly positive news turn to totally negative ._.

Regardless, nice find TC.


I'm being serious. It may be cold, but it's the truth. We've overpopulated the planet we rely on to survive, and this news is no help to that. /shrug For the record, yeah, I've had a lot of family die to cancer. Great grandma...uncle...mom has cancer...grandpa may have cancer...all leads to the same thing, in the end, no matter how hard you try to avoid it.

QUOTE(shinkukage09 @ Aug 11 2011, 10:33 PM)

Great. More people not dying on an already overpopulated planet. Lovely. That's totally what we need.

What?!?


How would you feel if your close relative/friend contracts cancer or some disease and only have only x amount of time to live? Wouldn't you want to save them, if possible.

Been down that road already.

Then how about if you had cancer and I you knew that someone was happy about it that you were going to die.

 

[nryn99]

Great. More people not dying on an already overpopulated planet. Lovely. That's totally what we need.

I find this to be nice news but I'm not sure if you're joking or if you seriously went out of your way to make seemingly positive news turn to totally negative ._.

Regardless, nice find TC.

I'm being serious. It may be cold, but it's the truth. We've overpopulated the planet we rely on to survive, and this news is no help to that. /shrug For the record, yeah, I've had a lot of family die to cancer. Great grandma...uncle...mom has cancer...grandpa may have cancer...all leads to the same thing, in the end, no matter how hard you try to avoid it.

i agree about he overpopulated part. also, the original rule of nature is survival of the fittest. with medicine, it kinda takes away our body's chance to provide natural immunity. though a lot would be sacrificed before someone will be born with natural immunity. those who are weak-bodied are now able to live on and populate, i'm not saying it's a bad thing though.

 

[ferofax]

Except that a cancer cure was actually found a few months ago in University of Alberta. The only reason why it's not widespread is because the big pharmaceutical companies apparently can't money off it. Yes, that's right, greed is preventing them from saving people's lives.

http://nutritiondietnews.com/canadian-rese...erested/853757/

that's fucking retarded it shouldn't be about making fucking $ they should release this world wide right now and finally be rid of this fucking disease that's MORE important!

nobody would want that, that's like the issue of free recyclable energy. people will kill to prevent that from happening, as it basically prevents companies from making money off of it. and that greed will eventually be the cause of mankind's downfall/extinction. along with the eventual evolution of the T-cell into T-virus, as someone mentioned. seriously, this is serious business.

 

[Acetic Orcein]

Except that a cancer cure was actually found a few months ago in University of Alberta. The only reason why it's not widespread is because the big pharmaceutical companies apparently can't money off it. Yes, that's right, greed is preventing them from saving people's lives.

http://nutritiondietnews.com/canadian-rese...erested/853757/

QUOTE(Bladexdsl @ Aug 11 2011, 10:24 PM) that's fucking retarded it shouldn't be about making fucking $ they should release this world wide right now and finally be rid of this fucking disease that's MORE important!

It is fucking retarded but it's also just money to them. Why make someone pay money for a drug they only need to take once or a few times that rids them of the disease completely when you can make them pay for drugs their entire life that nullify the effects of the disease.

Pharmaceutical companies are there to prolong your life and make as much money out of that prolonged life as possible.

One of the things that irritates me is when people think that 'x thing has shown promise in curing y disease, thus it should be released publicly straight away!!'
They can't just release stuff world wide without years of proper testing first.

With regards to DCA (the University of Alberta thing), it's hardly a miracle cure at all. It is now receiving private funding for clinical trials, so it's not simply a matter of pharmaceutical companies wanting to make money! (But I do agree that pharmaceutical companies can be money grabbers). If it really was shown to be fully effective, pharmaceutical companies would all jump at the chance to mass produce it. The real reason they aren't is because there simply isn't enough evidence to suggest how effective it is. Currently trials have shown that '4 people lived a bit longer and one person died'. Trials take a VERY long time and funding isn't so much of an issue now. Besides, other various tests have shown potential toxicity, so it really is important to test how effective it is in terms of treating cancer:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16966105
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/artic...272059090902123

In general, cancers can have a huge number of underlying causes, so for now it's not really wise to think that one single drug/treatment can cure all types of cancer. I'm not saying don't have faith! Especially if you're in the situation where you have been personally been affected by cancer. But... it's important to be realistic.

It might be worth reading this It refers to DCA, but I guess it's worth reading anyway. It also has some interesting links to read for more info:
http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/shortsha...rfaces-and.html

 

[squall23]

nobody would want that, that's like the issue of free recyclable energy. people will kill to prevent that from happening, as it basically prevents companies from making money off of it. and that greed will eventually be the cause of mankind's downfall/extinction. along with the eventual evolution of the T-cell into T-virus, as someone mentioned. seriously, this is serious business.

You mean, companies wouldn't want that. I as an average joe would love this.

 

[rad140]

One of the things that irritates me is when people think that 'x thing has shown promise in curing y disease, thus it should be released publicly straight away!!'
They can't just release stuff world wide without years of proper testing first.

With regards to DCA (the University of Alberta thing), it's hardly a miracle cure at all. It is now receiving private funding for clinical trials, so it's not simply a matter of pharmaceutical companies wanting to make money! (But I do agree that pharmaceutical companies can be money grabbers). If it really was shown to be fully effective, pharmaceutical companies would all jump at the chance to mass produce it. The real reason they aren't is because there simply isn't enough evidence to suggest how effective it is. Currently trials have shown that '4 people lived a bit longer and one person died'. Trials take a VERY long time and funding isn't so much of an issue now. Besides, other various tests have shown potential toxicity, so it really is important to test how effective it is in terms of treating cancer:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16966105
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/artic...272059090902123

In general, cancers can have a huge number of underlying causes, so for now it's not really wise to think that one single drug/treatment can cure all types of cancer. I'm not saying don't have faith! Especially if you're in the situation where you have been personally been affected by cancer. But... it's important to be realistic.

It might be worth reading this It refers to DCA, but I guess it's worth reading anyway. It also has some interesting links to read for more info:
http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/shortsha...rfaces-and.html

Finally, the first intelligent post in this thread. So much fail.

First of all, assuming this is ever something that's going to available to the public, it's going to be at least a decade before we see this as a viable form of treatment. There's all kinds of testing that still needs to be done, and there's nothing known about long term effects, if any. Seeing as T cells are part of your body's immune system, I would imagine there wouldn't be as many side effects as say, chemotherapy, but I'm not a biologist.

2/3 aint bad, but that's still only 66%, so that's hardly a cure. Very promising, but not a cure. It sounds like this method isn't going to be something you can just package into a bottle and sell. It's going to be individual, specialized, and no doubt very expensive.

Just in case there is any doubt, cells and viruses are not the same thing. One can't become the other (although cells can produce viruses, as anyone who took a high school science class can tell you). But yeah, T-virus coming soon lol.

And to all those worried about overpopulation, it's less about that then it is about sustainability. And assuming if cancer (or many cancers) are "cured", there are still going to be untold numbers of people in Africa and other developing countries dying of diseases that we've all but eradicated or cured. Or poverty. Or war.
But if you're really worried, feel free to off yourself to lessen the burden on the rest of us. /jks

But I love reading about all this new research that's going on.... hopefully I'll live long enough for it to be of use!

Oh, and here's a fun article about the HIV virus being combined with modified white blood cells to combat leukemia: http://www.geek.com/articles/geek-pick/hiv...llers-20110811/

 

[moose3]

The immune system works by matching up structural features on the surface of a foreign substance. Like a blind people only differentiating people by feeling their faces as they bump into them.

So if it's the immune system being used, that means these specific types of cancer cells look/feel different than normal cells. Unless some other type of cancer also has the same distinguishing characteristics, it's only effective for the specific cancer with these specific surface features.

Cancer is a broad term for unrestricted/unregulated and unnatural cell growth. A cancer can start from many different causes even when it's a cancer affecting the same organ/body part. So while this is great, don't start thinking it's a cure-all.