How close, do you predict, are we to curing cancer?

Question: How close, do you predict, are we to curing cancer?
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Asked by VFLinden to Daniela ?, ☣ Danna, Jonny, Juan, Lindsay on 10 Jun 2016.
- Juan Ortiz answered on 10 Jun 2016:
  
  Cancer is not only a disease, but a type of disease. There are many kind of cancers and the cure for some of them has already been discovered. However, there is a whole lot of cancers without a cure. In addition, cancer is not caused by microbes like when we get a flu, but by our own body that gets completely out of control and crazy. Then in a person with cancer is very difficult to destroy the cancer without harming the healthy body parts. This is a big challenge, because the medicines have to be like magic bullets that only kill the bad guys but not the good ones. This is extremely difficult and some scientist are working in this every day and lots of hours without a final solution. So unfortunately, I believe that cancer will be around us for a while 🙁 Although, who knows what can happen tomorrow? Maybe I will have to rewrite this answer. Fingers cross!!
- Jonathan Hunter answered on 10 Jun 2016:
  
  I recon we are still a long way off.
  On top of Juan’s points there are also person to person variation in cancer. But there is a branch of research called personalised medicines where drugs could be made specifically for you. But that a long way away from being in hospitals yet.
- Lindsay Robinson answered on 11 Jun 2016:
  
  I agree with everyone else. We’re a long way off from curing cancer. There are so many types of cancer and everyone’s body reacts differently. There are always breakthroughs with treatment and the understanding of the disease being made though so maybe one day.
- Danna Gifford answered on 11 Jun 2016:
  
  Like Juan and Jonny said, cancer isn’t a single disease, but a group of diseases. I don’t think we’ll ever be able to cure all cancers, and cancer cells can evolve resistance to cancer medicines (just like bacteria do to antibiotics). But thankfully, modern medicine is getting better and better at treating each type of cancer all the time.
- Daniela Lobo answered on 15 Jun 2016:
  
  Like the other scientists said, cancer is a complex group of diseases – we won’t be able to cure all of them because in some cases it’s just a part of a “natural” being alive process. Our life expectancy is much greater than it was 2 generations ago – we live longer, and as we get older, our DNA is not as good at repairing itself and makes more mistakes, which could lead to cancers. So far, there isn’t a way of preventing this process to happen, because it is a consequence of ageing.

Question: How close, do you predict, are we to curing cancer?

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