sun2surf.com — Scientists here believe they have uncovered the trigger for leukaemia, a cancer of the blood that afflicts millions worldwide.This could pave the way for the design of new drugs to combat the abnormal proliferation of white blood cells and might also lead to new treatments for other types of cancers.
Jun 20, 2006 View in Crawl 4
hattrickJun 20, 2006
My father passed 20 years ago from the benzene version. He was a mechanic and spent a lot of time around heated chemical cleaning systems. We had no other family history or cases of leukemia so it was unexpected. It has made me very cognizant of skin or vapor contact with chemicals like WD-40 or degreasers which usually have benzene in them. Bad stuff.
incongruityJun 20, 2006
The article states that the work has been published in the June 11th issue of Nature Cell Biology, yet I can't seem to find it listed on Nature Cell Biology's website's listing of the TOC for the current issue. Additionally, the dugg story credits the story to Reuters, yet the story can't be found through Reuters' own website. Sadly I think this is a hoax made to boost ad revenues. Though I really really hope I'm wrong on this...
thepharmacistJun 20, 2006
You DO realize that these companies have to do what it takes to please their shareholders right ? If they stopped making money for the sake of humanity's benefit, they would promptly be driven into the ground by the stock exchange, shareholders would massively sell their stocks, the company would go bankrupt and would not be able to do research on ANY new drug anymore.Blame the system, not those who are forced to comply with it.And besides, there are cures for leukemia. Once the cancer's gone, you don't have to take the meds anymore. Your statement is kind of pointless. Cancer is not an incurable disease. Yes, lots of people die from it, but more and more people beat it too.
juano11Jun 20, 2006
Article is somewhat misleading. There are many different kinds of Leukemia, likely with many different triggers. Just like there are many different kinds of cancer (the many leukemias being among them).It always annoys me when I hear "cure for cancer" as if there is ever going to be some single cure-all "Cancer" shot.Same here, the term "leukemia" is not really very descriptive. Even if this research turns out to be great, it will likely still only effect those with a particular sub-group of leukemia. Which is obviously a positive step, but it's not like we're going to see an end to leukemia with this study.
incongruityJun 20, 2006
full text in pdf form: <a class="user" href="http://www.nature.com/ncb/journal/vaop/ncurrent/pdf/ncb1432.pdf">http://www.nature.com/ncb/journal/vaop/ncurrent/pdf/ncb1432.pdf</a> (fwiw)
theman8631Jun 20, 2006
It's sad how many digg stories are breakthroughs in aids, cancer & luekemia yet we havn't made any steps large enough to prevent or stop them in any radically different ways then we already do.
thepharmacistJun 20, 2006
You need a subscription to Nature to get the article. You can also pay for this single article, or access through your University's proxy server. Nothing's fishy, it's just not free (like most serious science magazines, except for what's on PubMed central).