Yes, I'm for stem cell research

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Replies

  • ninerbuff
    ninerbuff Posts: 49,024 Member
    I AM AGAINST THIS
    Why?

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  • Lovely_77
    Lovely_77 Posts: 1,116 Member
    This is a topic near and dear for me. As my mom had battled cervical breast and angiosarcoma cancer. And due to that my doctors are on high alert for myself. My mother has worked for ontology for 20 years and its what I am thinking of specialising in myself. Premed right now... so have awhile to think which field is best. I just have anxiety with the whole cancer thing so not sure I could handle it emotionally. Hats off to all that do including my champion of cancer mother.


    Haha ontology nice auto correct... oncology

    I find it very interesting that you consider yourself pre-med and are considering specializing in oncology considering all of your comments on this thread about cancer are quite naive. I don't know how far along you are in your degree, and I know that half the people in health sciences at my university are "pre-medicine" (which isn't an actual program or anything it's just like I'm doing a health science degree and I am applying for medicine) so I guess I can't really give that a lot of weight but... you might want to do a little more research. Cancer is extremely complex - it isn't just uncontrolled cell proliferation and consititutive growth factor receptor signalling, it also involves anti-apoptosis (absence of cell programmed death), and very importantly abnormal cell-cell and cell-matrix interactions in order to transition from benign to metastatic. The issue with targeting cancer cells specifically is that they have a lot of markers common to the host cells, it's hard for the body (immune system) to recognize the cancer as non-self because.. well, they are self, technically. And even if it's recognized as non-self they are hard to kill because they don't respond to external apoptosis signalling. Additionally, within a population of cancer cells there are many unique mutations and so it isn't as simple as targeting a single marker because it is a mixed population. So... as you said earlier, yeah, there is a cure... to kill the patient with the highly toxic cancer drugs. I doubt that there is a cure as simple as inject T-cells back into someone, and I know that there is a lot of research being done on the immunology angle of targeting cancer but I don't think anyone is withholding a cure to cancer. There is no panacea for cancer. There will be better treatments that put more people into remission and make treatment less unpleasant for patients. Cancer is so complex you can't make a target specific enough for cancer cells and actually kill the whole population specifically due to the accelerated proliferation and high mutation rate of cancer cells that leads to a heterogenous population of cells. However, I would like to read the paper on the T-cell strategy you were talking about if you have a source for that study.

    tl;dr Cancer is really complex and there will never be a cure-all for it.

    I don't think that having an opinion based from what I have experienced with my mother snd three differrnt kinds of cancer makes me ignorant, but an idea based off of experience. I think you also missed the post where I stated that cancer will always rule the medical field even with a cure. I also never said that they were withholding a cure so I am very confused where that idea came from. I will definitely post a link to the T cell article I was discussing since you're showing an interest in it. They are not only looking into this for a cancer cure, which many patients have under went for treatment but as well to cure the flu, since the proteins of the flu virus never change even with mutation, they are assuming these T cells will always recognize it on a protein level. Pre-med is not a degree, or a course as it's still considered undergraduate and just simply means taking medical courses. I have an associates in applied science and just taking purely the last few medical courses I need to apply for PA school. I understand and know that cancer is not the same for everyone and how advanced it can be from one person to the next, which again brings up my point in saying cancer will always rule the medical field. Give me a moment to track down that article or a few and to post it.

    Your words:
    The point is there is already a cure for cancer what they are doing now is finding a better less life threatening cure.

    So if there's a cure, then doctors just let people die? I dont get it. Why do people still die from cancer?

    You may not have explicitly stated it, but given the fact that people die form cancer, you sure as hell implied it.

    there are effective treatments for cancer that have such significant side effects that the patients often don't survive even when the cancer itself is "killed" during the treatment.

    those could be considered "cures" by some people that need to be improved to be less life threatening, which is precisely what she said. radiation therapy and chemotherapy are examples.

    Somewhat effective treatment and cure aren't the same thing. I can take a number of medicines that effectively treat a cold, but none of them are considered a cure for the cold. Many people who receive radiation or chemotherapy still die from uncured cancer. Neither can be considered a "cure" - just a frequently effective treatment.


    And there are SO many more scenarios that you can't even begin to put in play here that you are yet again lacking the obvious knowledge to see. These patients that die regardless of surgery, chemo, radiation etc? When were they diagnosed? What stage was their cancer when they were diagnosed? Had it metastasized? Had it not? See, you are seeing a cure as a one track treatment when in actuality, prevention is the best cure even if they find a cure for all cancers known to man. Taking medication for a cold and comparing that to taking chemo and radiation for cancer, is nothing more than you comparing apples to oranges. Two entirely different situations here. But I will go ahead and indulge this idea of yours. Those medications you are taking for the COLD, is NOT to cure the cold as you already have it, it already multiplied in your body causing you to become ill. What those medications are doing is lessening the severity of your symptoms and MAYBE lessening the length of the cold. It isnt treating YOUR COLD, IT IS TREATING YOUR SYMPTOMS.
  • BrainyBurro
    BrainyBurro Posts: 6,129 Member
    This is a topic near and dear for me. As my mom had battled cervical breast and angiosarcoma cancer. And due to that my doctors are on high alert for myself. My mother has worked for ontology for 20 years and its what I am thinking of specialising in myself. Premed right now... so have awhile to think which field is best. I just have anxiety with the whole cancer thing so not sure I could handle it emotionally. Hats off to all that do including my champion of cancer mother.


    Haha ontology nice auto correct... oncology

    I find it very interesting that you consider yourself pre-med and are considering specializing in oncology considering all of your comments on this thread about cancer are quite naive. I don't know how far along you are in your degree, and I know that half the people in health sciences at my university are "pre-medicine" (which isn't an actual program or anything it's just like I'm doing a health science degree and I am applying for medicine) so I guess I can't really give that a lot of weight but... you might want to do a little more research. Cancer is extremely complex - it isn't just uncontrolled cell proliferation and consititutive growth factor receptor signalling, it also involves anti-apoptosis (absence of cell programmed death), and very importantly abnormal cell-cell and cell-matrix interactions in order to transition from benign to metastatic. The issue with targeting cancer cells specifically is that they have a lot of markers common to the host cells, it's hard for the body (immune system) to recognize the cancer as non-self because.. well, they are self, technically. And even if it's recognized as non-self they are hard to kill because they don't respond to external apoptosis signalling. Additionally, within a population of cancer cells there are many unique mutations and so it isn't as simple as targeting a single marker because it is a mixed population. So... as you said earlier, yeah, there is a cure... to kill the patient with the highly toxic cancer drugs. I doubt that there is a cure as simple as inject T-cells back into someone, and I know that there is a lot of research being done on the immunology angle of targeting cancer but I don't think anyone is withholding a cure to cancer. There is no panacea for cancer. There will be better treatments that put more people into remission and make treatment less unpleasant for patients. Cancer is so complex you can't make a target specific enough for cancer cells and actually kill the whole population specifically due to the accelerated proliferation and high mutation rate of cancer cells that leads to a heterogenous population of cells. However, I would like to read the paper on the T-cell strategy you were talking about if you have a source for that study.

    tl;dr Cancer is really complex and there will never be a cure-all for it.

    I don't think that having an opinion based from what I have experienced with my mother snd three differrnt kinds of cancer makes me ignorant, but an idea based off of experience. I think you also missed the post where I stated that cancer will always rule the medical field even with a cure. I also never said that they were withholding a cure so I am very confused where that idea came from. I will definitely post a link to the T cell article I was discussing since you're showing an interest in it. They are not only looking into this for a cancer cure, which many patients have under went for treatment but as well to cure the flu, since the proteins of the flu virus never change even with mutation, they are assuming these T cells will always recognize it on a protein level. Pre-med is not a degree, or a course as it's still considered undergraduate and just simply means taking medical courses. I have an associates in applied science and just taking purely the last few medical courses I need to apply for PA school. I understand and know that cancer is not the same for everyone and how advanced it can be from one person to the next, which again brings up my point in saying cancer will always rule the medical field. Give me a moment to track down that article or a few and to post it.

    Your words:
    The point is there is already a cure for cancer what they are doing now is finding a better less life threatening cure.

    So if there's a cure, then doctors just let people die? I dont get it. Why do people still die from cancer?

    You may not have explicitly stated it, but given the fact that people die form cancer, you sure as hell implied it.

    there are effective treatments for cancer that have such significant side effects that the patients often don't survive even when the cancer itself is "killed" during the treatment.

    those could be considered "cures" by some people that need to be improved to be less life threatening, which is precisely what she said. radiation therapy and chemotherapy are examples.

    Somewhat effective treatment and cure aren't the same thing. I can take a number of medicines that effectively treat a cold, but none of them are considered a cure for the cold. Many people who receive radiation or chemotherapy still die from uncured cancer. Neither can be considered a "cure" - just a frequently effective treatment.

    you can play semantic games if you want. i understood what she meant because i don't think there is any such thing as a "cure" for cancer. all you can do is treat malignant cancer cells.

    so rephrasing her statement as "treatments" instead of "cures" is still valid in my mind.

    we'll always have cancer cells in our bodies. it's when they become malignant that they become a problem.
  • QueenBishOTUniverse
    QueenBishOTUniverse Posts: 14,121 Member
    Somewhat effective treatment and cure aren't the same thing. I can take a number of medicines that effectively treat a cold, but none of them are considered a cure for the cold. Many people who receive radiation or chemotherapy still die from uncured cancer. Neither can be considered a "cure" - just a frequently effective treatment.

    Now we're just arguing semantics. The original statement was an admitted oversimplification of what we are all well aware is really an extremely complex issue. Oversimplification is a necessary evil when discussing topics like this on a public forum where not all participants have the same level of expertise. The statement was not ignorant, just simplified for general consumption.
  • QueenBishOTUniverse
    QueenBishOTUniverse Posts: 14,121 Member
    you can play semantic games if you want. i understood what she meant because i don't think there is any such thing as a "cure" for cancer. all you can do is treat malignant cancer cells.

    so rephrasing her statement as "treatments" instead of "cures" is still valid in my mind.

    we'll always have cancer cells in our bodies. it's when they become malignant that they become a problem.

    Quit typing faster than me dammit!
  • Lovely_77
    Lovely_77 Posts: 1,116 Member
    This is a topic near and dear for me. As my mom had battled cervical breast and angiosarcoma cancer. And due to that my doctors are on high alert for myself. My mother has worked for ontology for 20 years and its what I am thinking of specialising in myself. Premed right now... so have awhile to think which field is best. I just have anxiety with the whole cancer thing so not sure I could handle it emotionally. Hats off to all that do including my champion of cancer mother.


    Haha ontology nice auto correct... oncology

    I find it very interesting that you consider yourself pre-med and are considering specializing in oncology considering all of your comments on this thread about cancer are quite naive. I don't know how far along you are in your degree, and I know that half the people in health sciences at my university are "pre-medicine" (which isn't an actual program or anything it's just like I'm doing a health science degree and I am applying for medicine) so I guess I can't really give that a lot of weight but... you might want to do a little more research. Cancer is extremely complex - it isn't just uncontrolled cell proliferation and consititutive growth factor receptor signalling, it also involves anti-apoptosis (absence of cell programmed death), and very importantly abnormal cell-cell and cell-matrix interactions in order to transition from benign to metastatic. The issue with targeting cancer cells specifically is that they have a lot of markers common to the host cells, it's hard for the body (immune system) to recognize the cancer as non-self because.. well, they are self, technically. And even if it's recognized as non-self they are hard to kill because they don't respond to external apoptosis signalling. Additionally, within a population of cancer cells there are many unique mutations and so it isn't as simple as targeting a single marker because it is a mixed population. So... as you said earlier, yeah, there is a cure... to kill the patient with the highly toxic cancer drugs. I doubt that there is a cure as simple as inject T-cells back into someone, and I know that there is a lot of research being done on the immunology angle of targeting cancer but I don't think anyone is withholding a cure to cancer. There is no panacea for cancer. There will be better treatments that put more people into remission and make treatment less unpleasant for patients. Cancer is so complex you can't make a target specific enough for cancer cells and actually kill the whole population specifically due to the accelerated proliferation and high mutation rate of cancer cells that leads to a heterogenous population of cells. However, I would like to read the paper on the T-cell strategy you were talking about if you have a source for that study.

    tl;dr Cancer is really complex and there will never be a cure-all for it.

    I don't think that having an opinion based from what I have experienced with my mother snd three differrnt kinds of cancer makes me ignorant, but an idea based off of experience. I think you also missed the post where I stated that cancer will always rule the medical field even with a cure. I also never said that they were withholding a cure so I am very confused where that idea came from. I will definitely post a link to the T cell article I was discussing since you're showing an interest in it. They are not only looking into this for a cancer cure, which many patients have under went for treatment but as well to cure the flu, since the proteins of the flu virus never change even with mutation, they are assuming these T cells will always recognize it on a protein level. Pre-med is not a degree, or a course as it's still considered undergraduate and just simply means taking medical courses. I have an associates in applied science and just taking purely the last few medical courses I need to apply for PA school. I understand and know that cancer is not the same for everyone and how advanced it can be from one person to the next, which again brings up my point in saying cancer will always rule the medical field. Give me a moment to track down that article or a few and to post it.

    Your words:
    The point is there is already a cure for cancer what they are doing now is finding a better less life threatening cure.

    So if there's a cure, then doctors just let people die? I dont get it. Why do people still die from cancer?

    You may not have explicitly stated it, but given the fact that people die form cancer, you sure as hell implied it.

    there are effective treatments for cancer that have such significant side effects that the patients often don't survive even when the cancer itself is "killed" during the treatment.

    those could be considered "cures" by some people that need to be improved to be less life threatening, which is precisely what she said. radiation therapy and chemotherapy are examples.

    Somewhat effective treatment and cure aren't the same thing. I can take a number of medicines that effectively treat a cold, but none of them are considered a cure for the cold. Many people who receive radiation or chemotherapy still die from uncured cancer. Neither can be considered a "cure" - just a frequently effective treatment.

    you can play semantic games if you want. i understood what she meant because i don't think there is any such thing as a "cure" for cancer. all you can do is treat malignant cancer cells.

    so rephrasing her statement as "treatments" instead of "cures" is still valid in my mind.

    we'll always have cancer cells in our bodies. it's when they become malignant that they become a problem.

    Yes but then again we have had "treatments" for years for cancer, I do not believe in a cure that will prevent cancer from ever happening, we simply do not know who will fall to that.... I do however believe in a one set treatment someday, that will cure a patient. So really next time I will make sure I say there is already a cure to cure a cancer patient rather than there is already a cancer cure. Semantics is right. And, he can play them all he wants at this point I am starting to think he is simply a troll.
  • Lovely_77
    Lovely_77 Posts: 1,116 Member
    Somewhat effective treatment and cure aren't the same thing. I can take a number of medicines that effectively treat a cold, but none of them are considered a cure for the cold. Many people who receive radiation or chemotherapy still die from uncured cancer. Neither can be considered a "cure" - just a frequently effective treatment.

    Now we're just arguing semantics. The original statement was an admitted oversimplification of what we are all well aware is really an extremely complex issue. Oversimplification is a necessary evil when discussing topics like this on a public forum where not all participants have the same level of expertise. The statement was not ignorant, just simplified for general consumption.


    and yet, it has proven to STILL NOT be simplified enough lol