CANCER WILL BE CONOUERED.

Hawera Star, Volume XLVI, 19 August 1926, Page 7

CANCER WILL BE CONOUERED.

/'OTEfD SURGEON’S BELIEF

REMARKABLE PROGRESS ALREADY MADE,

CHICAGO, June io

Medical, science in the not distant future is bound to answer the centuries old question, “Wlia.t is cancer?” according to the hope held by Dr. Charles -Mayo, of Rochester, Minn., considered one of the world authorities on the subject. Of all the dread 1 diseases! that have afflicted mankind, this is the one that finally is causing the profession the most worry.

“J. wish 1 could sav," the noted surgeon declared in an interview, “that we are definitely on the road to mastery of this ..scourge. .1 hope we are, and .1. believe we are, but as yet we are only on the way. With the remarkable. progress our scientists have made in recent years we are still unable to say that our discoveries have worked out to a settled conclusion. “But when you consider that of the 92 elements that make up the known world only two —So and 87 are still unrecognised, anti when you look about you in the world of science and research and. observe the .almost miraculous uncovering. of the mysteries hidden .since the Garden of Eden, one must entertain the highest hopes that we shall know all about cancer in a few years. “Deaths from cancer in the I'nited .States total about 100,000 annually. This is a. large figure, hut in a population of 112,000.000, it i.s not necessarily alarming. “But medical science proceeds on the assumption that there must he some way of saving thousands of these lives. There is and some day wo shall know. “We have been able io cut down the mortality from this disease remarkably as it i.s. In 30 of the large hospitals, of this country originally 80 per cent, of the tumors of the breast were malignant. The percentage has been cut to 52 per cent, by early treatment, “Dr. .John. Joseph Ulo.odgood. of Johns Hopkins, has reduced the death rate from cancer of the mouth by 50 per cent. That is, where we have been able to discover the cancerous growth in time, we have succeeded in eliminating it. “But what concerns us most is that one-third of all cancers occur in the stomach. Only 2} per cent, originate in the .skin and 101 per cent in the breast. About 20.8 per cent, in the reproductive organs in women. “It is the internal cancer that bothers: us most, for cancer may attack tlte stomach for a long period before we know anything about it. Ultimately. it seems to me, we shall proceed to a method of diagnosis comparable to tlie Washerman test, whereby we can detect cancerous development in the stomach a.t its inception. “But what cancer is, what nourishes it. what this particular bacteria- or germ is. the .profession is yet unable to say.”