The space program and the success of our military during Desert Storm were not accidents. Our government committed to put a man on the moon, and to have a strong defense industry. It still is. More cancer research means more high-paying jobs, the hope of better treatments and lower health care costs, more exports to a world hungry for cancer cures, and maintaining America's eminence in the world science community. The private sector alone cannot finance this progress.
Basic research is expensive and risky in terms of results and time-frame of results.
Worse, FDA policies and talk of profit controls have made the already-risky and costly business of producing new drugs even riskier. We must treat cancer research as vital to the national interest. Ignoring cancer will not make it go away. I might add that an earlier speaker mentioned that ten AIDS drugs have been developed and marketed in the past 15 years, far more than new cancer drugs. Those AIDS drugs only appeared because AIDS research has built on the foundations of cancer research.