Machines Like Us

Despite optimistic claims by national leaders that America is finally turning the tide against cancer, a growing number of patient advocates and researchers say they are discouraged by continuing slow progress in the nation's 36-year war against the disease.

Many of the most anticipated new drugs have extended patients' lives by only a few months at great expense, they say, and researchers still don't understand what makes the disease spread -- the cause of 90 percent of cancer deaths.

Although deaths from cancer have declined slightly since 2002, cancer specialists say that reflects earlier detection of the disease as well as lifestyle changes, such as quitting smoking, more than dramatic improvements in treatments. For many types of cancer, once the disease has spread, or metastasized, the patient's chance of long-term survival is not much better than when President Nixon declared "war" on the disease in 1971, triggering what is now a $69 billion federal investment in cancer research. A patient whose lung cancer has spread to other organs, for example, has a 3 percent chance of surviving five years after the original diagnosis.

Read full story in International Herald Tribune