There is not one disease called “cancer”; rather, the word “cancer” refers to over 100 diseases that share some similarities. A single cure for cancer is impossible. In order to come up with cures for cancer, each type of cancer must be understood at the most fundamental level and then various approaches to treatment must be tested.
From the outside, medical research might look like it should be easy and straightforward. In reality, it is not. Every little tidbit of new knowledge comes only after years of painstaking work. One question in my own field of work arose in 1976, and only now is there even a hint of an answer to it. And it will take many more years of research to figure it out.
If scientific research were easy and straightforward, we’d already know everything, and people like me would be in different lines of work.
Doc44 PhD Biological Sciences (human histology)