Rene.Style

I use to wear a button during my daughters illness that read ‘Cancer Sucks!’.  It was a bright yellow button with red lettering about 2 inches across and it could have been a shining neon light for all the attention my little button got.  It showed me that no matter where I went, whether at the grocery store, a soccer game or out at a restaurant, there was a common bond with all of the people I came in contact with.  Everyone’s life is touched by cancer in some way, shape or form.  For many it is a direct relationship of a mother, father, brother, sister or spouse, but for everyone we all know someone fighting that battle.  How is it that so many people suffer with this disease, yet no cure has been found?  Hundreds of millions of dollars are spent on research year after year, decades over the decades, yet cancer seems more prevalent today than it ever was.  Where is all this money going and why can’t they find a cure? We all stood up to cancer this past weekend and what progress has been made with all the money raised?   I recently got an email request via Facebook from a long lost friend who I haven’t seen in decades about signing a petition to keep Avastin on the FDA approved list of drugs.  Her sister is battling breast cancer and right now Avastin is the only thing helping her, yet the FDA is considering disapproving it as a drug which will impact thousands of individuals who count on it for their survival.  How does this happen?  Is cost the overriding factor?  Is healthcare going to be determined strictly upon a cost basis with no thought given to the people who need the medication and the families who are devastated due to the disease?  In the midst of battling for her life, a woman is now faced with having to drum up public support to get people to sign a petition in order for the FDA to reconsider their position.  Who has that kind of energy? Yet without that determination to speak up, countless people will lose their access to Avastin and few have the financial where with all to pay for it out of their own pockets.  Could it be that cancer care , treatment and cure is based upon dollars and cents?  What is the incentive to cure a disease and do the right thing when so many are employed by its existence?  Could it be that the cure has already been found and has not been divulged?  Could it be that the majority of the medical field employs those fighting cancer so it makes no economic sense to put so many out of work?  I do not know the answers to these and many other intriguing questions about this disease, I just know what I found out many years ago, Cancer Sucks!