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A Very Short History of Cancer Research Funding

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A Very Short History of Cancer Research Funding ONCOLOGY A very short history of cancer research funding In his book The Emperor of All Maladies, Siddhartha Mukherjee tells the story of one of the turning points in the history of cancer medicine. A turning point that he dates to May 1947. At this time, cancer was a fatal disease and as a subject of discussion it was rarely mentioned among close friends, least of all at polite social gatherings. Cancer was an ugly disease that appeared to harvest lives regardless of the individual’s background, lifestyle or social stature. Its victims were carved up in radical surgical procedures or subjected to experimental chemical trials with little or no understanding of the underlying mechanisms. After a brief period of remission, most patients succumbed to new tumors, some far more aggressive than their predecessors. Research was performed by a handful of dedicated doctors who were nameless, faceless and relegated to the basements of hospitals to perform research with dubious outcomes. If cancer was ever to have a future as a disease to be tackled seriously, it needed serious funding. Cancer had to become a disease that people were not afraid to talk about in public. And the focus had to be on a patient that nobody could deny deserved all the help in the world. The story begins 19 years earlier, with a baby in a basket… TECAN JOURNAL 1/2016 7 ONCOLOGY The baby girl was abandoned on a seat Every dime counts survival of patients. Farber had been in the Sheridan Square Film Theater experimenting with a new drug, an The Variety Club was inspired by the in Pittsburgh at the start of the Great antifolate called aminopterin. Farber March of Dimes, a campaign initiated by Depression of 1928. The note attached had demonstrated the first signs of the actor Eddie Cantor when Franklin D to the baby read: partial remission of pediatric leukemia Roosevelt was re-elected President. In by aminopterin in a four year old girl. 1936, Roosevelt, himself a polio victim, Please take care of Empowered by a rare positive result, established the National Foundation of my baby. Her name is Farber was now obsessed by his vision Infantile Paralysis. Polio research and Catherine. I can no longer of a hospital dedicated to the research of patient care received a massive boost take care of her. I have childhood leukemia. eight others. My husband in funding thanks to the nationwide campaigning efforts of the March of is out of work. She was Koster had found his man. Together, Dimes, which reached out through the born on Thanksgiving Day. Koster and Farber began to hatch plans radio waves into the living rooms of I have always heard of the to make the hospital a reality. In 1948, private homes across America. Dimes goodness of show business they launched the Children’s Cancer in envelopes flooded into the White and I pray to God that you Research Fund. Their first raffle raised an House from factory workers, housewives, will look after her. Signed, a impressive $45,456, but hardly enough schoolchildren and Girl Scouts. In the heartbroken mother. to open a hospital. Koster recalled first year alone, 2,680,000 dimes were the success of the Catherine Sheridan collected. By the late 1940s, John Enders The baby was named Catherine campaign and convinced Farber that had succeeded in cultivating the first live Variety Sheridan, her surname after the they needed a poster child, a mascot for poliovirus in the lab. The development of theater where she was found, and her childhood leukemia. the polio vaccine was a direct result of middle name after the Variety Club, the public funding initiative. In 1938, FDR an association of actors, producers, Jimmy gives cancer a voice focused on cancer, and signed legislation directors, writers and film theater owners that gave birth to the National Cancer The challenge was fraught by a that adopted Catherine as their ward. Institute. Its initial budget was $400,000. seemingly intractable problem. Most of the children were extremely weak; far The media exposure from the adoption Bill Koster of the Variety Club of New too weak to appear on radio or make of baby Catherine was far greater than England began the search for a new public appearances. Most children the members of the Variety Club could cause that his club could own. He had died within months of their diagnosis. ever have dreamed. During the war years, visited many hospital labs and found Finding a patient for the public to root the entertainment industry had boomed medical scientists buried under piles for was not going to be easy. Scouring and Hollywood realized that they of papers, but none of them had the through all the patient lists, Koster had earned the adoring, if somewhat ambition to think big. Until he met and Farber landed on Einar Gustafson. fickle, goodwill of the general public. Dr Sidney Farber. Einar was not suffering from leukemia, The Variety Club redefined itself as a rather he was being treated for a rare philanthropic organization that was keen Farber was at Children’s Hospital Boston intestinal lymphoma. He was young, to reinforce the idea of ‘the goodness of working on childhood leukemia, a fresh faced and radiated hope. Einar show business’. disease that had confounded the medical was the boy that the public would want community – no treatment had been to save from cancer. identified that extended the 8 TECAN JOURNAL 1/2016 ONCOLOGY Einar was renamed ‘Jimmy’ and, in 1948, Albert Lasker was an advertising cure cancer firmly in the public eye, the Jimmy Fund was born. Using smart executive at the firm Lord and Thomas, millions of federal dollars have poured PR moves, like recruiting the Boston inventors of classic ads for Lucky Strike into cancer research, so that the US Braves to sing the team’s song with and Sunkist. He famously said: “If a today enjoys a dominant position and is a Jimmy on the radio, the Jimmy Fund toothpaste… deserved advertising at the magnet for talent in cancer research. attracted thousands of donors, many rate of two or three or four million dollars of whom queued in the lobby of the a year, then research against diseases… Children’s Hospital to personally hand deserved hundreds of millions of dollars”. Further reading in their donations so that Jimmy could The Emperor of All Maladies - watch the Braves on TV. The Jimmy The self-styled group of ‘Laskerites’ A Biography of Cancer. Siddhartha Fund far surpassed its original target of included action-oriented businessmen, Mukherjee. ISBN 978-0-00-725092-9. $20,000, raising $231,000 in its first year. movie producers and lawyers. They Since its foundation, the Jimmy Fund has ousted the presiding scientific board of The Sheridan Square Theater on Cinema Treasures raised $750 million for the Dana-Farber the American Society for the Control www.cinematreasures.org/theaters/16551 Cancer Institute using the tried and of Cancer (ASCC) and renamed the trusted method of fundraising through organization the American Cancer The Jimmy Fund public engagement. Society – the ACS. Their first move was www.jimmyfund.org to gain nationwide public awareness The Dana-Farber Cancer Institute Going to the country by publishing articles about cancer www.dana-farber.org screening and detection in Reader’s Farber learned that the fight against Digest. Over the following years, the The Lasker Foundation cancer was not just about science – it results of their massive campaigns were www.laskerfoundation.org was as much about being seen and clearly evident. Donations rocketed heard. He needed to understand the from $832,000 in 1944 to over $12 intricacies of political lobbying. He million in 1947. needed a clear strategy and a reason for people to believe in his cause. Farber’s coalition and friendship with Gaining and sustaining the public’s Mary and Albert Lasker would transform attention required the persuasive art the funding of cancer research. Farber of advertising. Enter Mary and had the scientific credentials needed Albert Lasker. to sway Congress, and the Laskers stood for constant lobbying ‘on the Hill’ Mary Lasker was a star saleswoman, and extremely effective advertising. a long-time lobbyist and a political Most significantly, Mary Lasker’s work campaigner. A survivor of pneumonia ultimately led to President Nixon and the Spanish flu of 1918, she became famously declaring War on Cancer the most influential health activist of her with the signing of the National Cancer day. Mary was horrified by the ravages of Act of 1971. With the lobbying of the mastectomy operations, so she focused government, and with the urgency to her keen mind on cancer. Mary’s husband TECAN JOURNAL 1/2016 9.
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