>the author should also answer the question whether he honestly thinks he would have been better off 90 years ago if some cancer got detected with him in, say,

>the author should also answer the question whether he honestly thinks he would have been better off 90 years ago if some cancer got detected with him in, say, 2 weeks from now (such things usually happen really fast). No, the hypothetical situation in your question misses the gist of the article: the hypothetical situation should still be in present day but with much less funds having been spent on cancer research.