Cancer is the most difficult health problem humans face. It will still be there long after we conquer neurodegeneration, atherosclerosis and diabetes. It is a m

Cancer is the most difficult health problem humans face. It will still be there long after we conquer neurodegeneration, atherosclerosis and diabetes. It is a major failure mode of all multicellular life. Dinosaurs got cancer. Every animal from mice to elephants gets cancer. It is startlingly common in humans. The cellular pathways altered in cancer existed before animals existed. It is an inescapable hangover from our evolutionary origins as unicellular organisms. The only way to beat cancer is to upgrade the human organism to design out anachronistic evolutionary trade offs and prevent cancer development. The way we treat cancer now - the slash, burn, poison, hunt paradigm - is inhumane, expensive, and of limited effectiveness.