Cancer touches us all, and you probably have a loved one who has, at some point, received a devastating diagnosis that changed their lives forever. Half of us are likely to be diagnosed with cancer in our lifetimes, so it’s crucial that we continue to study and learn about this complex illness so that we can stop it from cutting lives short all over the world.
Cancer research is important because we know that it works.
Thanks to decades of work into prevention, diagnosis, and treatment, 1 in 2 people diagnosed with cancer today will survive their illness. But there is still so much more work to do if we want that survival rate to keep improving.
Because the World Health Organization is currently predicting that deaths worldwide due to cancer will almost double by 2050.
New treatments are urgently needed to stop cancer in its tracks and prevent anyone else from losing a loved one too soon. But without understanding the disease, we simply have no way to figure out how to make that happen.
It is more important than ever that we continue to fund cancer science, and we can't do that without your support.
Imagine trying to repair a car without any understanding of how it is put together. We would just keep blindly trying different things until something works. In the meantime, we would waste a lot of time and effort. The situation is much the same with cancer. We can’t cure what we don’t understand. Discovery research provides us with information on how cancer works, and therefore helps us to design clever ways to cure it.
What does cancer research actually do?
Cancer is complex - it's a collection of over 200 diseases that can be as individual as the patient themselves. Cancer cells are adept at mutating and changing, outwitting therapies and becoming resistant to treatments.
There is a lot we still don’t understand about cancer, but as science and technology advances we’re now able to learn more and more.
Worldwide Cancer Research funds discovery research, the very first step in the research pipeline. Because cancer research might be a long process, but it always starts with an idea. Our funding allows researchers to explore bold ideas about how cancer starts, grows and how we can stop it - challenging our basic understanding of cancer biology.
The next stage, after discovery, is translational research - turning the idea into something practical, for example a new drug. The final stage is clinical research - when things are tested in patients to find out how safe and effective they are.
The route through the cancer research pipeline is long and challenging.
It can take decades for a brilliant idea to become a new strategy that helps patients in the clinic, but it is crucial to keep funding discovery research so that more ideas can make it down this pipeline.
As a discovery cancer research charity the researchers we fund are united in their purpose: to understand cancer better.
Cancer research isn't just about finding new treatments, though that is a big part of it. Cancer research can also lead to breakthroughs in preventing cancer, or better ways to diagnose it.
For example, by studying the microorganisms in the gut, Curestarter researcher Dr Nuria Malat has discovered a new way to detect pancreatic cancer signs in patient stool samples. This cheap, non-invasive, test could be revolutionary for diagnosing pancreatic cancer early - a disease which is typically only noticed late, after the cancer has developed too far for many treatments to be effective.
Some of our researchers are looking at brand new innovative cures, while others are looking at improving existing treatments so they are more effective for patients.
Dr Bruno Di Stefano
Exploring targeted precision therapies for leukaemia after discovering a potential vulnerability in how acute myeloid leukaemia starts.
Professor Sophia Karagiannis
Working on how to make immunotherapies work better for patients with melanoma, as immunotherapy currently only works in about half of patients.
Dr Jamie Dean
Studying radiotherapy and investigating how the timing of doses can improve how effective the treatment could be for patients.
I do think there will come a day when we can make certain cancer types a chronic disease, rather than a lethal disease.
Why is cancer research essential?
Ultimately, whether the work they are doing improves prevention, diagnosis or treatment of cancer, our international cancer researchers are focused on one goal: preventing lives from being cut short, allowing us to have more time with our loved ones. They hope that a cancer diagnosis will not be so devastating in future, and that as treatment options improve cancer can be something that people can live with and enjoy a high quality of life.
But without cancer research, we will not be able to find new cures for this devastating disease. Cancer is hard to cure, and to reach a day when no life is cut short, we must keep funding essential discovery research.
Throughout history, we’ve made leaps and bounds in understanding disease creating new medicines, and those incredible breakthroughs were only made possible thanks to research. Cancer is no different.
There is still so much we don’t understand about how cancer works – especially in the complex interplays with our bodies other systems, like the microbiome or our immune system.
The most common treatments for cancer that we have now - surgery, chemotherapy, and radiotherapy - have been around for some time.
And, while they are constantly improving, they don't always work for all patients. Sometimes cancer can become resistant to treatment, and when it does work, these treatments can come with difficult side effects - drastically changing a person's quality of life and adding extra challenge to their diagnosis.
Cancer researchers are looking for new treatments, ones that work for more patients and have fewer side effects. This includes targeted therapies that work on specific types of cancer cells, and immunotherapies that help our body's own immune system fight cancer better.
Our researchers also want to know more about secondary cancer, or metastasis, when cancer spreads to other places in the body. Metastasis is the primary cause of cancer death, so understanding how cancer spreads, what triggers that process, and how we can stop it would save lives all over the world.
While we fund research into any type of cancer, many of our researchers aren't looking at any cancer in particular - focusing instead on fundamental cancer biology. The advances that they make could change the course for many different types of cancer.
What has cancer research already achieved?
In the 1970s, only 1 in 4 people in the UK who were diagnosed with cancer would survive the disease for more than 10 years. Today, the survival rate has doubled. This incredible progress is thanks to the tireless work of cancer researchers, and supporters like you.
Cancer research has led to improvements in chemotherapy, better ways of spotting cancer early, and breakthrough new treatments like olaparib. In the 1990s, a researcher called Steve Jackson came to us with a project looking at how our DNA repairs itself. Fast forward 20 years, and this research had led to the discovery of a drug that could block cancer cells repair systems and prevent certain cancers from growing.
Today, olaparib has helped over 140,000 cancer patients with ovarian, breast, prostate and pancreatic cancers, allowing many people to live their lives in a way that felt impossible when they received their diagnoses – people like Fiona, who says that olaparib has given her hope for the future.
Cancer research changes lives
There are many patients worldwide who would not be alive today if it weren’t for the incredible advances that cancer research has brought over the last few decades. We know that by continuing to fund brilliant researchers, more people will benefit and fewer lives will be cut short.
Curestarter Cathy
Diagnosed with lymphoma after losing her mum to breast cancer and while her dad was battling prostate cancer, Cathy credits her survival to lifesaving advances in cancer research.
Curestarter Sam
Aged just 11 years old when his family learned he had stage 4 liver cancer, Sam recovered thanks to advances in chemotherapy and surgery, and is now a huge advocate for supporting cancer research
Curestarter Tamron
Diagnosed with peritoneal mesothelioma and told she had only one year to live, 15 years on Tamron wants to inspire others with hope, saying her doctor describes her as a walking miracle.
Why does funding cancer research remain vital today?
While research has brought us so far already, there is still so much we don’t understand about cancer. It is crucial that we keep funding discovery research to uncover more ways to prevent, diagnose and treat the disease. As technology and research methods improve, they open up new ways to investigate cancer.
Studying our genome
Our genome, the entirety of the genetic code that makes us unique, can uncover differences and signals that are crucial to how cancer works. The human genome was first sequenced in its entirety in 2003, and it took 13 years to complete this mammoth task. Now, due to advances in sequencing technology, the same can be done in a matter of hours. Many of our researchers use these new methods to study sections of the genome, for example Dr Eric Conway, who is using novel sequencing techniques to study ovarian cancer.
AI and machine learning
Another very recent advance in technology that could transform cancer research. Dr Daniel Lietha in Spain is currently using AI to design new protein shapes - a task that is impossibly complicated without this technology. This could uncover new ways to target the proteins that help cancer survive, and allow researchers to design new precision drugs that could revolutionise how we treat cancer.
The dark genome
Until recently, a large part of our genome was considered 'junk' because it didn't control any specific processes in our bodies, and scientists didn't think it was worth studying. It is only since new technology has been available that researchers have realised this area, called the 'dark genome' holds hidden secrets that could lead to new ways to tackle cancer. Researcher Dr Daniel Hodson is looking into the dark genome to uncover how lymphome, a type of blood cancer, develops and grows.
Drugging the undruggable
The more we learn, the more we find out that there are ways of treating cancer previously deemed impossible. Dr Laura Soucek discovered a way to target a gene that is faulty in over 50% of all cancers, but that scientists had long dismissed as impossible to tackle. Her discovery drug Omomyc is now in clinical trials treating patients - something that wouldn't have been possible without our support a decade ago.
It’s hard to overstate the importance of fundraising and donors that contribute to Worldwide Cancer Research, to research and to researchers like myself. Trying to do the work is very expensive and we cannot do it without you.
Your cancer research FAQs:
Why is cancer research important?
Simply put: without cancer research, we will not be able to find new cures for this devastating disease. We know research works – breakthroughs in cancer therapies over the last 50 years have come from dedicated cancer research scientists. There’s still a lot more that we don’t yet understand, so continuing to fund this research is crucial if we want to see a day where no life is cut short by cancer.
What does cancer research do?
Cancer research is about understanding cancer better – why it starts, how it grows and spreads, and ultimately how we can stop it. It’s only with this understanding that our researchers can find new ways to tackle cancer. This includes prevention, diagnosis and treatment. At Worldwide Cancer Research, we fund discovery research – the first step in the research pipeline.
How has cancer research helped people survive cancer?
It is only thanks to research that we have any cancer therapies. For hundreds of years, doctors and scientists improved surgery and learned how to remove tumours. Chemotherapy and radiotherapy were developed through extensive research. Now, more personalised and targeted therapies are becoming available for certain types of cancers, helping people survive their cancers and live their lives, allowing them to spend more time with their loved ones.
Why do we still need funding for cancer research?
While research has come so far, there is still so much that we don’t know. Cancer is complex and our potential to understand and treat it increases with new technologies like fast genome sequencing and AI algorithms. Discovery research is key to unlocking new ways to tackle cancer, leading to new cures that can help people all around the world.
What is the goal of cancer research?
As a cancer research charity, our goal is to see a day where no life is cut short by cancer. We know that the best way to reach this goal is to keep funding cancer scientists with brilliant ideas, that pave the way for new cures.
What makes Worldwide Cancer Research different?
We’re the only UK charity that funds discovery research into any type of cancer, anywhere in the world. We fund the best cancer research ideas in the world to make progress towards a day where no life is cut short by cancer.
What breakthroughs has medical research led to?
So many parts of modern medicine that we take for granted only exist because of bold research. Vaccinations, anaesthesia and germ theory were all huge breakthroughs made possible by supporting medical research – and we would not be able to stay healthy today without them! You can read more about the amazing research behind some key medical breakthroughs here.
How can I support cancer research?
You don't need to be a scientist to change the course of cancer research. Becoming a Curestarter by supporting Worldwide Cancer Research is a positive way to be part of something bigger. However you support us, every contribution is crucial, because every breakthrough starts with a single action.
Donate today to start new cures
Be part of the united effort to stop lives being cut short by cancer.