The Truth in Small Doses: Why We're Losing the War on Cancer-and How to Win It
For this eye-opening look at why the U.S. is losing the war against cancer, Leaf, the former executive editor of Fortune, interviewed more than 1,000 people over nine years. The statistics are depressing: in 2013, 580,000 Americans will die of cancer, the nation’s number-two killer for the past 75 years. And more than 1.6 million will be diagnosed. Of course, many survive. Leaf himself was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s disease at age 15. Leaf blames the failure to cure cancer on mismanagement. No one is coordinating individual research efforts or generating “get-a-man-on-the-moon” urgency. Leaf would like to see more focus on “preemption”; today only 7 percent of the National Cancer Institute budget goes to prevention. He would also like the government to fund people rather than projects, to focus less on publishing studies and more on solving problems, and to avoid awarding money to the same institutions. Siddhartha Mukherjee’s Pulitzer Prize–winning The Emperor of All Maladies (2010) got Americans talking about the stalled battle against cancer. Leaf’s book keeps the conversation on track. --Karen Springen