“And I believe we need a moonshot in this country to cure cancer.”
April 26 marks the 30th anniversary of the Chernobyl nuclear power facility accident in the former Soviet Union. Soon after the accident, I received a call from the Soviet ambassador to the U.S. on behalf of Mikhail Gorbachev asking me to come immediately to Moscow.
Over the past century, we have had many wars on cancer, and now we have a national “moonshot” to be spearheaded by Vice President Joe Biden, announced in President Barack Obama's Jan. 12 State of the Union Address.
Academic cancer centers have a major and unique role to play in enhancing cancer research, clinical care and education. This role will increase in value as our understanding of the complexity of cancer grows and is applied to care of patients.
What does it say about our national commitment to research integrity that the Department of Health and Human Services' Office of Research Integrity has concluded that a five-year ban on federal research funding for one individual researcher is a sufficient response to a case involving millions of taxpayer dollars, completely fabricated data, and hundreds to thousands of patients in invasive clinical trials?
I have watched the rhetoric and heated debate about screening at age 40, now 45, and 50 for 25 years and am miffed that the discussion consistently ignores the obvious things we can do to save lives.
Emma Whitehead was a six-year-old girl battling relapsed leukemia for the third time when her parents were told she had run out of treatments. Her doctors offered one last hope—enrollment in a clinical trial at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia in a completely new immunotherapy. It was a phase I toxicity trial for both children and adult patients, and few patients on phase I trials are ever cured. But Emma's family was given the miracle they had prayed for. Five years later, Emma is now a happy, healthy, 11-year-old girl who likes to play piano and soccer. Emma is cured.
Almost one year ago (on April 30, 2014), House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.), along with Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee Ranking Member Diana DeGette (D-Colo.) announced the launch of 21st Century Cures, an initiative aimed at accelerating the pace of cures and medical breakthroughs in the United States by ensuring that our laws are keeping pace with innovation.
When the Lung Master Protocol clinical trial (Lung-MAP or S1400) (1) was launched in June 2014, the goal of this first-of-its kind trial was simple: find effective treatments for seriously ill patients suffering from a specific type of lung cancer.
The recent announcement by the Innovation Center at the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services regarding the launch of an Oncology Care Model is an important step toward patient-centered cancer care.
