My father died of cancer in April 2003. He was only 64 and in apparent good health until his cancer diagnosis. He watched his diet, got regular exercise, had no vices like alcohol, drugs, or tobacco, and lived a conservative lifestyle. He was neither depressed, nor repressed. His father had lived to 79, with a brother who lived to 83, and another who's still alive at 86. I took it for granted I'd have another 15-20 years with my Dad.
His cancer started as a renal cell carcinoma (kidney) that spread to a vein, and from there to the rest of his body. Carcinomas produce a tiny vascular system of their own that steals blood flow from the organ they inhabit. They also produce dramatically increased amounts of a substance called COX-2. Inhibiting COX-2 retards the creation of the cancer's vascular system and starves the tumor.
COX-2 also seems to play other key roles in the development of cancer cells, but no successful, cancer-specific COX-2 inhibitors are on the market. Instead, doctors rely on chemotherapy and radiation.
Alas, a COX-2 inhibiting cancer drug does exist. It started its clinical trials for FDA approval in 1999. In Phase I, the FDA concluded that the drug Endostatin (by Entremed, Inc.—NASDAQ: ENMD) has no apparent toxicity. Compare that with chemo or radiation. The drug is currently in Phase II of clinical trials. The research, much of which I studied in my father's final weeks, shows great promise, but the FDA wouldn't let my father have it.
This drug might have saved my father's life, and it almost certainly would not have killed him, but the cancer certainly did.
Endostatin won't be available for years, and the National Cancer Cooperative Group reports that 350 other new treatments are also awaiting FDA approval. Meanwhile, the American Cancer Society says 552,000 Americans will die of cancer this year alone.
