Volume 55, Number 3 · March 6, 2008
Cancer: Malignant Maneuvers
By Richard Horton
The Secret History of the War on Cancer
by Devra Davis
Basic Books, 505 pp., $27.95
When President Richard Nixon signed the US National Cancer Act into law on December 23, 1971, he declared, 'I hope that in the years ahead that we may look back on this day and this action as being the most significant action taken during this Administration.' Nixon killed his hope with bewildering hubris. But his call for a war on cancer remains the most astonishingly ambitious, and ultimately flawed, political commitment to a disease in the history of humankind.[1] With the joy of hindsight, one cannot help viewing Nixon's juxtaposition of cancer next to man's successful efforts to split the atom and walk on the moon with admiration mixed with incredulity. It is morbidly ironic that Nixon's wife, Pat, died from lung cancer in 1993.
Review, 4309 words
To read the full text of this piece, please choose one of the following options:
|
If you are already a subscriber to the Review's electronic edition, please sign in: |
To subscribe to the electronic edition, please press the button below. |
To purchase access to this article for $3, please press the button below. |