Breast Cancer Argumentative Essay

Introduction When it comes to the topic of cancer, most people readily agree that we have made leaps and bounds in research and treatment mechanisms. Where this argument usually ends, however, is on the question if finding a cure for cancer can be a reality. While some are convinced that a cure will come with time, others believe it’s just not logical. The US waged a war on cancer when Nixon was in office, 1971, yet we haven’t overcome it yet (Gorski). After research, I believe that cancer cannot be cured because of the complexity, natural causes, the American lifestyle, and the cost. Cancer has been around for thousands of years, yet it has just recently come to focus in the past few decades. Breast cancer is the earliest documented cancer

According to The National Institute of Health, “cancer is a genetic disease—that is, cancer is caused by certain changes to genes that control the way our cells function, especially how they grow and divide” (The Genetics of Cancer). Not only is cancer genetic because of how our cells reproduce, but because of the DNA we get from our parents. The genes we receive from our parents cause 5-10% of cancers. This is a point of concern because it is a challenge to edit the genes of an embryo, and even with the ability to edit some genetic cancers don’t show up until later in life. A tool that could change the way we look at cancer is CRISPR. This is a genetic editing that allows us to snip and replace DNA segments. The biggest issue with CRISPR is how recent it is. Currently we don’t know if there could be any negative long term effects of the implementation of this tool. Many people commonly point out that we need a cure for cancer as a blanket statement. But cancer isn’t just one disease it’s many (Gorski). Each person’s cancer is unique, meaning in the US there are 14.9 million cancers each needing an individual treatment plan. This shows that there will be a one treatment cure all. While we do have treatments for some kinds of cancer, there are many more that we don’t. Dr. Morrison, a cancer stem cell expert from the University of Michigan, discusses a hypothesis

The variety of cancer treatments is constantly expanding but before these treatments can be used readily they have to be tested on humans. Many people are too concerned with the side effects to try it. They also worry about what happens if the treatment causes them to die and the burden it will put on their family. By offering them a tax break it lessens the fear of financial burden. Tax breaks are realistic solutions because it won’t kill the US economy and it only has to be passed through the US government rather than a through a bunch of third party members. By more people being willing to participate in these trial allowing us to further our research and continue to find treatments to make cancer more