Cancer
Wars: How Politics Shapes What We Know
and
Don't Know About Cancer
by Robert N. Proctor
Reviews
Booknews, Inc., August 1, 1995
A scholarly history of the social biases,
economic interests, and political stakes that have long influenced debates
over the causes, prevention, and treatment of cancer. Proctor asserts that
the causes of cancer are largely known and exposes some startling statistics
and disturbing conspiracies concerning its ever-rising rate, observing
that the curing of cancer is a political problem as much as it is a scientific
one. Annotation copyright Book News, Inc. Portland, Or.
From Booklist, March 1, 1995
In an enlightening, informative, and well-documented
book, Proctor shows how and why the war against cancer has failed. Funding
sources, he avers, have put too much emphasis on research (i.e., the scientific
details of disease mechanisms and of treatment) rather than on the practical
(i.e., methods of prevention and the exploration of broad causes). He examines
the growth of genetics that has changed the focus of cancer studies from
"cancer families" to biotechnology, and he does especially well in distinguishing
between the statistical and the public health significances of cancer rates.
He outlines the political wars at all levels of the cancer-fighting enterprise
and points out that laws and regulations can be disastrous by both obscuring
information necessary for the public to know and thwarting attempts to
pursue previously untrodden research paths. Finally, his coverage of the
politics, hypocrisy, and obfuscation of the tobacco industry is excellent.
William
Beatty - Copyright© 1995, American Library Association. All rights
reserved
Synopsis
Written by a highly regarded historian of
science, this meticulously researched, eminently fair, and very provocative
book attempts to answer the question: Why, given all the time and money
spent on cancer research, can't we get consistent answers to the most fundamental
questions about prevention and treatment?.
Synopsis
Presenting six case studies that demonstrate
the affects of politics on science, a cautionary study explains how fact
manipulation, scare tactics, and cover-ups obscure research, prevention,
and treatment.
Customer Comments
amazur@syr.edu from Syracuse,
NY, February 5, 1999
Excellent social history of American
views about cancer.
American views of the causes of cancer are
only partly the result of developing science. Proctor shows how our ideas
about this disease were influenced by prominent spokespeople with special
interests and by broader social trends. He wisely questions our prevailing
policy of cure rather than prevention.
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