Science

The irony of being someone who works in the field of pharmaceutical advertising - with an emphasis on Oncology products - and then being diagnosed with cancer, has not been lost on me.  In fact, at its core, I find it to be amusing how life has a funny way of working sometimes.

I'm coming to you from the annual convention for the American Association of Cancer Research.  It's a fitting time to remind ourselves about the expensive and expansive exploration that is going on around the world as part of the tireless struggle to find new and increasingly effective therapies for dealing with the many types and permutations of cancers in our lives.

Ponder this sobering reality for a moment: It takes 10 to 15 years and around $1 billion to develop one drug that ultimately gets approved for use.  Despite these significant investments in time and money, 90% of attempts at new drugs that even make it through to clinical trials . . . fail.  I myself am a beneficiary of said successful effort (autologous stem cell transplant, and a maintenance regimen featuring a drug based on thalidomide - which is a whole other story about the crazy life cycle of a drug: Thalidomide Story).

Today's drash is not intended as a justification for the price of drugs.  Rather: Just another inconceivable moment of reflection along my journey, where I, The Canswer Man, am standing here doing my job, surrounded by the people and the process and the pharma companies and the pursuit of possibility that have basically saved my soul, and given me a surprising quality of life while managing the battle that is raging inside my body.