A Whale of a cure

By Josephine Lassailly

With over two million cases of cancer in the United States each year and about twenty million worldwide, this disease has felt like an inevitable possibility for many. With its existence plaguing the public for hundreds of years the scariest part is that there is still no cure. How come we have the most innovative technologies and techniques but can’t seem to figure out this particular puzzle? Radiation and chemo count more as palliative care for cleansing what is within but no single eliminating factor for this sickness has been found. WIth this being said new research is being put at the forefront in recent years. When studying cancer it is important to note that its origins are genetic meaning it has everything to do with a person’s DNA and the mutations it undergoes through cells and cell production. Cells reproduce at an accelerated rate more than three hundred billion times a day with this reproduction some cells become dewired and lead to changes in the DNA. These mutations overload the production process and are repaired  in a less than ideal way and lead to what is known as cancer. These extra cells sometimes form tumors which is what most people are familiar with when recognizing cancer. Keeping on with this train of thought, larger bodies and organisms should have higher chances of developing cancer as their cells need to keep up with the rate at which their bodies are growing and they are composed of more cells. This is an accurate observation for people with obesity however new  research has found that animals like elephants and whales have unique properties that veer off cancers and gene/ cell based diseases. This is known as Peto's Paradox since their bodies recognize that they have more cells they are equipped with protective DNA repair mechanism this is a general alteration within their genetic identity. They also have a tumor suppressing genes at an increased amount which is different from humans as they usually carry only one copy. These research findings could have a multitude of positive effects on our healthcare system and could potentially be the pathway to a cure. A cure might not look like the generic pill or shot that we've become accustomed to for other diseases; it could be therapies directly targeting our genes and DNA. This has already started to be brainstormed as our idea of what constitutes healthcare could be susceptible to change. Healthcare should be about prevention not only treatment. There has always been this question of why? Why do the healthiest most active people get cancer, why do the youngest most innocent lives have to be taken away so soon due to a disease they can’t even pronounce yet? It all goes back to genetics. If scientists are able to come up with new strategies to limit this our entire system could change. This is not only exclusive to cancer, this could be the key to understanding a multitude of gene related diseases. Now, gene alteration has received some backflash as some worry that this could lead to a purist mentality, where people take it too far and try to remedy very little discrepancies of their DNA. But I would argue that people are already doing that now by injecting non approved substances in order to improve themselves fully (peptides) . It's all a matter of restrictions and professional usage regulations that would be put in place and a finding this significant should not be held back to the fear of the potential misuse. Overall, we as humans have so much to learn from nature and are getting closer to true progress. Awareness needs to be brought to these topics so that efficient funding and publicity can be provided. Creative solutions like these would make the United States even more worthy of the leading research and medical care country in the World. And guarantee generations to come a better healthier future.