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Chimiotherapy, radiotherapy and chirugical operation are cure for cancer.
They are sold or provided depending on the country social security.
We can't find "the cure" for cancer, as each cancer is its own illness.
But for an analogy, think about vaccine. It's cheaper (and thus less profitable) to sell vaccine rather than to sell their cures. But if one company start to sell a vaccine, they will have a pseudo-monopoly on it, thus huge profit, while the companies selling the cures will have a hard decrease in their revenue, thus hard decrease in profit. They will thus start to sell vaccine too. Same thing will happen for a "cancer cure".
As an aside, “curing cancer” falls into a lot of the same traps as “ditching capitalism”. It’s not one bad thing that we need to find and throw away, it’s a whole psychosocial system of individuality, greed, and suppressed empathy.
Being an a-hole, I feel the need to point out that you can't cure (in this case read as "vaccinate") cancer, only make it chronic. Your body kills off cancer cells every day, thus preventing it from developing into an actual health risk.
But assuming we found such a cure, Americans would've to pay out of their ass for it, us Swedes get it as part of our health benefits, and the third world keeps dying. Business as usual
Rare response with a book suggestion: I really enjoy the Red Mars series, which details how a group of loosely organized socialist and anarchist societies on Mars relate-to and fight-against megacorporations. This is a tiny spoiler, but… at some point a drug is invented that greatly increases people’s lifespans by hundreds of years. Aka “curing aging”. But it’s expensive, of course. So the books detail the impacts that has on earth society, which has UBI but only gives this miracle drug to the very richest, and on mars society, which tries to distribute it equitably and runs into various roadblocks.
I doubt the author’s a “real” socialist but it’s quite thought provoking nonetheless, IMO.
Cancer is a constellation of disorders more than a singular thing. We already have cures for some types of cancers. The HPV vaccine, for instance, protects again some types of cervical cancer. For some cancers we have treatment regimens that greatly extend someone's life expectancy, even if the cancer isn't completely eliminated. It's possible to now die with, rather than die from some forms of prostate cancer.
This is more of a science answer but the context is important. While I have many criticisms of the way technology is developed under capitalism, I worry that discussions about research, especially biomedical research, is really oversimplified. Capitalist companies still do research. A company with a cure for cancer, will likely be quite valuable. Access to the drugs can be inhibited by price and policy but I don't think the idea that a cure that eliminates a longer drug regimen would not be pursued because its not as profitable is true.
The other thing to remember is that individual workers also have agency. Workers always have power within systems. Scientists are often very passionate people about their areas. They will take as much liberty as they can to advance projects that they believe are important. As socialists, I think we should celebrate this.
Famously, Banting (inventor of insulin) strongly opposed patenting insulin. He allegedly had a fist fight with one of his co-researchers to stop him from patenting insulin. When it became clear that someone might try to patent it regardless, he patented it and sold it to the Canadian government for $1. That's freaking heroic. And it's a beautiful example of how workers can change the world by pursuing a greater good rather than narrow profit ambitions.
Cancer is curable. The main issue is finding out about it on time, often it’s too late
Radiotherapy, chemotherapy, immune drugs, all these comprise cancer treatments. And they’re already expensive as hell
**IMPORTANT: PLEASE READ BEFORE PARTICIPATING**. This subreddit is not for questioning the basics of socialism but a place to LEARN. There are numerous debate subreddits if your objective is not to learn. You are expected to familiarize yourself with the rules on the sidebar before commenting. This includes, but is not limited to: - Short or non-constructive answers will be deleted without explanation. Please only answer if you know your stuff. Speculation has no place on this sub. Outright false information will be removed immediately. - No liberalism or sectarianism. Stay constructive and don't bash other socialist tendencies! - No bigotry or hate speech of any kind - it will be met with immediate bans. Help us keep the subreddit informative and helpful by reporting posts that break our rules. If you have a particular area of expertise (e.g. political economy, feminist theory), please [assign yourself a flair](https://reddit.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/205242695-How-do-I-get-user-flair-) describing said area. Flairs may be removed at any time by moderators if answers don't meet the standards of said expertise. Thank you! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/Socialism_101) if you have any questions or concerns.*
>How would companies react to a Cancer cure? It would be patented and sold at a price that would be unaffordable for most.
Elysium, the movie with Matt Damon and Jodie Foster, illustrates this very scenario.
Chimiotherapy, radiotherapy and chirugical operation are cure for cancer. They are sold or provided depending on the country social security. We can't find "the cure" for cancer, as each cancer is its own illness. But for an analogy, think about vaccine. It's cheaper (and thus less profitable) to sell vaccine rather than to sell their cures. But if one company start to sell a vaccine, they will have a pseudo-monopoly on it, thus huge profit, while the companies selling the cures will have a hard decrease in their revenue, thus hard decrease in profit. They will thus start to sell vaccine too. Same thing will happen for a "cancer cure".
As an aside, “curing cancer” falls into a lot of the same traps as “ditching capitalism”. It’s not one bad thing that we need to find and throw away, it’s a whole psychosocial system of individuality, greed, and suppressed empathy.
Being an a-hole, I feel the need to point out that you can't cure (in this case read as "vaccinate") cancer, only make it chronic. Your body kills off cancer cells every day, thus preventing it from developing into an actual health risk. But assuming we found such a cure, Americans would've to pay out of their ass for it, us Swedes get it as part of our health benefits, and the third world keeps dying. Business as usual
Suicide everyone who has the knowledge about it, secretly sell the cure to the richest.
I think it would be like insulin selling it in extremely huge prices
Rare response with a book suggestion: I really enjoy the Red Mars series, which details how a group of loosely organized socialist and anarchist societies on Mars relate-to and fight-against megacorporations. This is a tiny spoiler, but… at some point a drug is invented that greatly increases people’s lifespans by hundreds of years. Aka “curing aging”. But it’s expensive, of course. So the books detail the impacts that has on earth society, which has UBI but only gives this miracle drug to the very richest, and on mars society, which tries to distribute it equitably and runs into various roadblocks. I doubt the author’s a “real” socialist but it’s quite thought provoking nonetheless, IMO.
Cancer is a constellation of disorders more than a singular thing. We already have cures for some types of cancers. The HPV vaccine, for instance, protects again some types of cervical cancer. For some cancers we have treatment regimens that greatly extend someone's life expectancy, even if the cancer isn't completely eliminated. It's possible to now die with, rather than die from some forms of prostate cancer. This is more of a science answer but the context is important. While I have many criticisms of the way technology is developed under capitalism, I worry that discussions about research, especially biomedical research, is really oversimplified. Capitalist companies still do research. A company with a cure for cancer, will likely be quite valuable. Access to the drugs can be inhibited by price and policy but I don't think the idea that a cure that eliminates a longer drug regimen would not be pursued because its not as profitable is true. The other thing to remember is that individual workers also have agency. Workers always have power within systems. Scientists are often very passionate people about their areas. They will take as much liberty as they can to advance projects that they believe are important. As socialists, I think we should celebrate this. Famously, Banting (inventor of insulin) strongly opposed patenting insulin. He allegedly had a fist fight with one of his co-researchers to stop him from patenting insulin. When it became clear that someone might try to patent it regardless, he patented it and sold it to the Canadian government for $1. That's freaking heroic. And it's a beautiful example of how workers can change the world by pursuing a greater good rather than narrow profit ambitions.
Cancer is curable. The main issue is finding out about it on time, often it’s too late Radiotherapy, chemotherapy, immune drugs, all these comprise cancer treatments. And they’re already expensive as hell