• Question: If we stop cancer, do you think it will be replaced by another disease?

    Asked by krazykatie to Josh, Chris, Rebecca, Rob, Susan on 17 Jun 2015. This question was also asked by holster2003, 1s443.
    • Photo: Josh Meyers

      Josh Meyers answered on 17 Jun 2015:

      Hi Katie,

      The harsh truth is ‘yes’. The increased rates of cancer in the world are in part due to the ageing population. People live longer so their cells have more time in which to go wrong (and they get worse at preventing it with old age).

      There are other diseases which also present higher risks at old age such as Alzheimer’s. If we manage to overcome the curse of cancer, it is likely we will run into the next life limiting disease.

      But then hopefully we will have a new age of scientists struggling to improve the quality of life for everyone.

    • Photo: Susan Cartwright

      Susan Cartwright answered on 17 Jun 2015:

      In one sense, no: there’s no reason why another disease should automatically arise when we deal with one (nothing “replaced” smallpox, for example).

      In another sense, yes: something else would emerge as a principal killer of older people – something which is currently less important because people get cancer first. Dementia is an obvious example.

    • Photo: Rebecca Dewey

      Rebecca Dewey answered on 18 Jun 2015:

      There’s no reason that something else will “replace” it, i.e. it won’t be missed!

      But if we do stop cancer, we’ll move on to the next big thing – as Susan says, dementia probably!

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