Even after all this time The sun never says to the earth, You owe Me. Look what happens with a love like that, It lights up the Whole Sky.
Hafiz
My partner Lauren’s brother-in-law, her oldest sister’s husband, was diagnosed with leukemia a couple of years ago. It took a strangely long time to figure out what his symptoms meant, so he was ill for longer. Last fall, his son donated bone marrow to David. As part of that process, David’s immune system had to be obliterated. Before he was able to go home, he contracted RSV and, without the ability to fight the virus, died within a day or two. David was a brilliant economist, an expert on China. He was a loving father to Isabel and Evan and husband to Paige. We shared the habits of the observer. We could sit together, mostly in silence, and watch the hullabaloo of four sisters and a mother doing what they do.
I received news of the death of a college classmate recently. We weren’t particularly close, but traveled in similar circles. Early in our first year, we crossed paths at the boathouse. He had rowed in high school. At some point that year he stopped rowing, while I continued for four years. He was a serious student and I’m guessing he found the rigors of committing to a team to be incompatible with his academic goals. We were in the same social club and had a number of mutual friends. I remember his dry sense of humor and Canadian politeness. He went on to have a successful legal career and then moved into finance. When he died he left his wife and two sons. He was diagnosed with colon cancer in his late 40s, which means that he survived almost ten years. When Dawn was diagnosed in her mid-40s, her primary tumor was never found, but her team learned enough from pathology to treat her for colon cancer. Back then, in 2008, the survival rate was about five years. She got four. So things seem to be improving. She had chemo every two weeks, until she couldn’t, in hopes of buying more time.
The incidence of cancer increases. The World Health Organization predicts that in 2050 there will be more than 35 million new cases, a 77% increase from the 20 million or so in 2022. Presumably, some portion of this has to do with increased life expectancy: the more years we have, the greater the chance of getting cancer. With improvements in diagnostics and treatments, many of these cancers will be survivable. In fact, this is the goal of Steve Jobs’s son’s work: not finding a cure (or cures), but making it possible to live with cancer.
In the bigger picture, why are we seeing this increase? There’s no single answer. But I’m fairly convinced that, as with climate change, this is the price humanity is paying for the hubris of thinking we can master nature - for our attitude of supremacy. I don’t mean this in the sense of some kind of divine retribution. But these things are linked to our lack of humility and our mindless insistence on growth - on putting profits ahead of people. We have paved over the planet for our own convenience. We’re reaping what we’ve sown.
This year, PMC will raise its one billionth dollar for Dana Farber. Impressive indeed. But I want to imagine a world in which PMC is obsolete.
Addendum (3.26.2024)
Almost a year ago, a lone federal judge in Amarillo, Texas ruled in a case brought by a group of anti-choice doctors who asked that the drug mifepristone, found safe and effective by the FDA twenty-four years ago, be banned. These doctors, operating under the Orwellian banner Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, ‘shopped’ for a judge they were certain would grant their request. So a single judge, basing his ruling on theology, not science, overruled the FDA’s long standing decision about this drug, which has allowed millions of women to self-administer abortion healthcare in the privacy of their own homes. If this decision is allowed to stand, it sets a dangerous precedent FOR ALL DRUGS deemed safe and effective by the FDA. If you are ideologically opposed to a drug, you can find a sympathetic judge to overrule the FDA. This case has made it to the Supreme Court, who are hearing it today. Experts say that the case has no basis in fact or law. But we have a corrupt SCOTUS bent on twisting the law to fit their preferred image of America. The stakes are high. Imagine the fruits of Dana-Farber’s research being canceled for political, rather than scientific, reasons. We are living in dangerous times. VOTE BLUE!
Why do I ride?
I ride because I miss my wife and friend, Dawn Anne Jahn Moses;
to express my gratitude to the multitude of neighbors, friends, family, colleagues, and health professionals at Dana-Farber and Brigham and Women’s who helped Dawn do what she wanted to do (she was cared for by many, but I want to name a few of those she was closest to: Charlie Fuchs, Robin Sommers, Mary Maloney, Jane Bausch, Anne Chiavacci, Matt Kulke): extend her days with us, in both quantity and quality;
for Georgia and Henry.
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