Cancer Research UK talk about the current cancer survival rate having reached 50%, and their aim to reach 75% by 2034; my reading of their language is that they are optimistic that cancer (an area which already has a track record of progress) is a good tractable area to fund.
That goal can be easily reached. You just need to double the people that you diagnose with cancer.
In practice, it’s possible to increase the number of people that get diagnosed with cancer by increasing the amount of screening that’s done.
The US does more screening than Europe and has as a result a higher cancer survival rate. In recent years the US government came to the conclusion that the US does overtesting that doesn’t provide clinical benefits and pushed back breast cancer screening to a higher age.
The goal of cancer research should be about lowering the number of cancer death per year. If there’s the argument that curing other illnesses increases the cancer death rate, then an alternative goal might to reduce the amount of people who die to cancer under the age of 80 years.
This article (on The Conversation) describes in detail why survival rates are misleading—due to Lead Time and Length Time bias—and how death rates reveal the actual benefits of screening.
That goal can be easily reached. You just need to double the people that you diagnose with cancer.
In practice, it’s possible to increase the number of people that get diagnosed with cancer by increasing the amount of screening that’s done.
The US does more screening than Europe and has as a result a higher cancer survival rate. In recent years the US government came to the conclusion that the US does overtesting that doesn’t provide clinical benefits and pushed back breast cancer screening to a higher age.
The goal of cancer research should be about lowering the number of cancer death per year. If there’s the argument that curing other illnesses increases the cancer death rate, then an alternative goal might to reduce the amount of people who die to cancer under the age of 80 years.
This article (on The Conversation) describes in detail why survival rates are misleading—due to Lead Time and Length Time bias—and how death rates reveal the actual benefits of screening.