Conventional wisdom has long been that there are many types of cancers, and that we won't come up with a single "cure for cancer"--that there will be many different treatments for different problems. But some researchers think that they may have in fact found a low-cost drug that cures many types of cancer, with few side effects.

This seems like pretty big news.

[Via Geek Press]

Another Taxol?

Ignore this post. Nothing to see here.

Hey, Big Pharma c'est moi. And I find this interesting and worthy of further research, but I think the excitement is a bit premature.

Killing cancer in a petri dish is easy - just ask Derek Lowe (who I see just posted!)

Killing it in mice isn't all that hard either, from what I hear.

Killing it in humans seems to be a lot harder.

("Big Pharma" doesn't want to cure cancer, you say?

Well, pharmaceutical execs, salesmen, marketers, scientists, and everyone else at the companies get cancer just like anyone else.

As do their friends and families.

Which is a pretty big motivator to accept even a cure they can't make a cent off of - not to mention that (assuming it has significant effect on cancers in humans) if it has any unpleasant side effects or delivery issues, overcoming those is lucrative and quite patentable.)

They've also found one that prevents most types of cervical cancer. Pity none of the nutjobs in the southern states will take it.

Why, Adrasteia, is it made of boiled Yankees? ("I've got ta burn mah boots -- they teched YANKEE soil!" -- Yosemite Sam.)