Terry Thompson’s Blog

When we consider the “cancer economy,” we must understand where the money comes from and where it goes.  The biggest provider of funds for cancer research is the National Cancer Institute (NCI), a government funded agency.  Its budget proposal for 2010 was $5.1 billion.  This budget has increased more than 50% in the last decade.  The American Cancer Society (ACS) is a non-government fund raising institution that receives most of its money through donations from major fund raising projects.  The ACS took in $1.8 billion in public support, grants, gains, and investments in 2008.  These two flagship institutions manage most of the billions of dollars that are collected and funneled into the hundreds of research programs and medical institutions each year.  Whether from taxes paid or donations volunteered, each and every one of us shares in providing both institutions well over $6 billion annually year after year.  Of course, there are many other national and local charities, such as the Komen Foundation, that raise the total price of the war on cancer far above that amount.

Cancer fund raising has become a national pastime. It is integrated into our very culture.  Seemingly, almost every occasion for social outlet has a “proceeds to benefit cancer research” attached to it.  And, who has not made an impulse purchase because it had a pink ribbon associated with it?  Some methods are as bland as contributing profits from premium priced postage stamps.  Others are as bizarre as peddling calendars featuring nude men or women baring it all in the name of cancer research.  Whether we are running shoulder to shoulder with a thousand others in a 10K or dropping our loose change in a can at a fast food restaurant, we are touched almost every day by the constant beckoning to donate a part of ourselves to fight the war on cancer.

The pervasive public and private effort to fund this war is presented as a backdrop for the premise of my book, A New Strategy for the War on Cancer.  The magnitude of the “cancer economy” should be considered with every point addressed in the chapters.  Please don’t misunderstand me.  I am in no way critical of the institutional fund raising.  If we are to ever raise the flag of victory over this diabolical disease, it will take even more than the present level of national and international fiscal willpower.  The issue is not the money we are raising.  The issue is how we are spending it.

My next post will reveal just how much–actually how little–these funding organizations are providing for anything other than what supports conventional treatment.  The pittance of funding received for complementary therapy research will shock you.

President Nixon’s State of the Union speech on January 22, 1971 included one of his principal goals–to eradicate cancer.  He declared:

” I will ask for an appropriation of an extra $100 million to launch an intensive campaign to find a cure for cancer, and I will ask later for whatever additional funds can effectively be used.  The time has come in America when the same kind of concentrated effort that split the atom and took man to the moon should be turned toward conquering this dread disease.  Let us make a total national commitment to achieve this goal.  America has long been the wealthiest nation in the world.  Now it is time we became the healthiest nation in the world.”

On that evening, our great nation became officially committed to the annihilation of this enemy.  The president’s declaration was later described as the beginning of the “war on cancer.”  It was to be pursued with the same national determination that led us into the nuclear age and that put a man on the moon.  Virtually unlimited resources were pledged. 

On December 23, 1971, fueled by the aggressive support of the president and numerous other political leaders, the National Cancer Act was signed into law. This government action infused unprecedented dollars and authority into the National Cancer Institute (NCI) to oversee a National Cancer Program of research and education. The NCI budget would bypass the traditional scrutiny of its parent organization, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), and would be submitted directly to the president. The Act funded new research centers and contracted with prominent existing centers in an all-out national crusade to conquer cancer.

This bold venture was not without precedents.  The president had alluded to what the ingenuity and power of America had proven capable of producing.  We had models of what national determination with enough funds could do.  

 Nuclear fission/fusion was just being studied by the United States when the Second World War began in 1939.  Fearful that Nazi Germany was developing a nuclear weapon, our nation assembled our best scientists complemented by some international experts displaced from Europe.  This team, supported by every material and financial resource they needed, crafted and tested a device inconceivable in the minds of previous war strategists.  Six years after a a concept discussion among a few scientists, an atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima.  The war against Japan was over. 

Sixteen years later, we embarked on another journey of seemingly impossible proportions.   Responding to the Soviet’s launching of Youri Gagarin into space orbit on April 2, 1961, President Kennedy boldly challenged Congress and the nation, on May 25, 1961, to land a man on the moon by the decade’s end.  Space became the battle ground of the cold war.  On July 20, 1969, just eight years later, the world watched Neil Armstrong make his “giant leap for mankind” to the surface of the moon further preserving our freedom through the aerospace realm.  Both of these historical feats combined cost this nation less than what we are currently spending EACH YEAR on cancer research and education.  In the nuclear and space races, the enemy’s objectives were thwarted in relatively short order.  In the cancer race, we are in a seemingly endless marathon, and the enemy is winning.

The paragraphs above are extracted from my book, A New Strategy for the War on Cancer.  Please continue to watch this blog for further extracts.  I welcome your comments.

Within twelve months from the date you are reading this, over 1.4 million Americans will be newly diagnosed with cancer.  As you read this, approximately 12 million people are being treated or monitored for cancer in the U.S.  Of those, about 560,000 will die within the next year.  Forty percent of all cancer victims ultimately lose the battle and die.  Each day, over 3800 of us Americans enter the battle field of cancer.  Each day, over 1500 people die on that battle field.  That is the equivalent of six fully loaded 767 jumbo airliners crashing each day killing everyone on board.  Six jumbo jet crashes a day! Expanding our view, we find that, according to the World Health Organization, about 12.3 million people worldwide will develop cancer this year.  Of those, 7.6 million will die from the disease—more than 20,000 each day.  Globally, 62% of those with cancer will die from the disease compared to 40% in America.   

The annual rate of death from cancer in the United States in 1971 was 199 per 100,000.  The most recent statistics (2006), show that the rate changed only slightly in 35 years—181 per 100,000.  That is a decrease of only 9 percent over the last 35 years of available record.  Granted, we have seen a somewhat larger decrease since the rate peaked in the early 1990s, but the trend still shows relatively little progress over the four decades.  I use the 1971 baseline, because that is when President Richard Nixon officially declared war on cancer as I will discuss shortly. 

In over a third-of-a-century following the declaration of war on cancer, American taxpayers have deposited over $70 billion in the National Cancer Institute (NCI) in the fight against the disease. This investment, however, pales in the light of what has been spent by drug companies, educational institutions, charities, and other government agencies.  All totaled, Americans have spent, through taxes, donations, and private research and development, over $200 billion, inflation-adjusted, to wage this war since 1971.  Yet, all that money and effort over all those years have reduced deaths from cancer by only 9 percent.     Another statistic that has to be considered is the actual number of deaths from cancer.  Because of our country’s population growth each year, even with the small downward trend in the cancer mortality rate (deaths per 100,000), the total number of deaths from the disease has maintained an upward trend.  When the 2004 data was released by the NCI in 2007, the cancer fighting organizations raved about how the declining mortality rate over the past decade had produced actual decreases in the total number of cancer deaths two years in a row.  In other words, this death rate had declined more than the accompanying population rate had increased.  Although the death rate declined slightly again in 2005, the actual number of cancer deaths increased again from 2004 to 2005 according to according to the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS).  So, with few exceptions, total cancer deaths continue to rise each year.

My objective in writing A New Strategy for the War on Cancer is to present the current status of cancer treatment, what has to change if we are to win the war, and how you can be a vital part of the solution.  I have very deeply instilled personal reasons for this work. 

As the Thompson family entered the year 1998, we were on a mountain top.  My wife, Connie, and I were enjoying success in my second career as a staff pastor in a large church.  Our sons, Mike and Chris, had earned their college degrees, had married wonderful, gorgeous wives, and were enjoying early achievements in their careers.  Mike’s wife, Melinda, was pregnant with our first grandchild.  Life was beautiful.  We eagerly awaited that year to unfold.  Then all hell broke loose. 

Our grandson, Blake, was born with a rare congenital leukemia.  He was rushed by helicopter to Arkansas Children’s Hospital where he would spend the short month of this life on IVs and monitors.  Watching him slip away, day by day, was torture on the parents and grandparents, but was nothing in comparison to the agony that precious little one suffered.  Blake only experienced one thing in his life—the evil of cancer. 

Melinda was at the hospital with her baby boy 24/7.  Her grandmother who had raised her from childhood was also battling cancer.  She died while Melinda was miles away with Blake.  Her grandmother and grandfather had raised her because, immediately after her birth, her mother died of cancer.        

Two months after we buried Blake, my wife of 31 years was diagnosed with breast cancer.  The love of my life—healthy, active, spirited, and full of joy—was soon reduced to one who seldom had a good day.  Connie suffered through chemotherapy, radiation, and surgeries for three years before her death in 2001.  I was, of course, at life’s lowest depth at that point.  By God’s mercy and grace, my children, our extended family, and I made it through those horrendous times, but none of us will ever be the same again. 

As I was researching in preparation for this book, my eldest brother, Verl, died of lung cancer.  Less than a year later, another brother, Dale, died of a rare cancer that attacked his heart.  Neither smoked, and both led healthy, active lifestyles.  Their lengthy treatment confined them to the bed most of the time.   

My niece, in her early forties, currently strives to raise two teenagers although at times practically immobilized by her treatment for breast cancer. One of my best friends has dealt with cervical cancer for over seven years.  She continues in and out of chemotherapy.  The vitality, beauty, and strength that characterized these women have given way to constant exhaustion, nausea, hair loss, and feelings of hopelessness.  Another of my best friends was recently diagnosed with recurring breast cancer on the fifth anniversary of being declared cancer-free from the first bout.   

If you haven’t experienced cancer, someone very close to you most assuredly has.  It has invaded the very heart of our culture.  We must—we absolutely must—find a more promising way to wage this war.  It is time to deploy the unconventional forces.  Keep the conventional operation going, but open up the battlefield to combatants that are not of the mainstream.  Both conventional and unconventional forces fighting side-by-side as one will overwhelm the enemy.  And it will be defeated!

Continuing a preview of my soon-to-be-released book, A New Strategy for the War on Cancer.  The position of the book is that the traditional strategy to defeat cancer, compared to the mind-boggling advances in other fields of medicine, is powerless.  It is ineffective.  What if, instead of digital cameras, the photography industry was still trying to sell us on better film and developing processes?  What if, instead of DNA, the juries could still only convict on eye witnesses accounts?   What if, instead of storing volumes of data on a tiny flash drive, your company was still procuring larger file cabinets?  Conventional oncologists must stop limiting their methodologies repertoire to those of the last century.  Many more must cross over to integrative oncology. 

Well meaning, benevolent people are sacrificially funding cancer research at the rate of hundreds of millions of dollars every year.  If not directly from our pockets, we are each contributing to it through our taxes.  This money is going almost exclusively toward the development of pharmaceutical chemicals, equipment, programs, and facilities to enhance conventional treatment that is not getting the results needed.  Grants and contributions, as well as tax dollars, must be shared proportionally with the integrative oncology movement.

Please don’t misunderstand me.  I am not categorically opposed to conventional medical research.   Most integrative oncologists have devoted the first years of their professional lives to conventional medicine with countless successes.  Granted, much progress has been made and is being made in early detection, quality of life for cancer patients, and even survivability rates.  However, I view the trend toward complementary therapies by integrative oncologists as key to a shift in the overall cancer fighting strategy which can finally bring victory to the protracted war.  This trend at least acknowledges the potential of complementary options, proven through the crucible of clinical trials, and put into practice in concert with conventional options.  The problem is the the disease is gaining in frequency and strength faster than we can attack it. A cancer treatment transformation of astonishing magnitude must happen, and soon, in order to claim victory over this enemy.

Our current strategy is too institutionalized and narrow to meet the challenge.  We must look beyond our present scope and expedite our progress beyond our present rate.   We must establish undeniable credence to the prospects of integrative oncology.  Our research must extend to include unconventional possibilities.  We must make it easier for patients to obtain and afford treatments outside the mainstream.  We must generate additional funds to underwrite genuine scientific research in areas supplemental to conventional medicine.  To these ends, this book is written.