Hi, Can anyone tell me what Cancer Research UK actually do?
I am watching the MotoGP and every advert break the is Cancer Research saying how they are saving more and more lives from cancer, how they are beating cancer, and yet I am always reading how more and more people are dying from treatable cancers, how most drugs that can save lives are too expensive for the NHS, but the reason they are so expensive is because of the cost of research. Non of these are developed by cancer Research, so what are they researching and how are they beating cancer?
All they seem to do is advertise and ask for money, but when you then read that the CEO of Cancer Research UK, Michelle Michell earns a base salary of £276,900, with undisclosed bonuses, and I am not going to lie, it makes me very angry.
My dad died from lung cancer six years ago, I read on here from so many people that have lost a love one to cancer, and yet, they claim they are beating cancer. The cynic in me feels that if they spent less on advertising and more on actual research they may actually save lives.
Am I alone in questioning how exactly they are beating cancer and that the top brass are paying themselves far too much?
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I lost my beloved husband on 23rd November 2024 to penile cancer. He found out on 22nd October 3 days after our 22nd wedding anniversary. 13th November we found out there was nothing they could do as it spread to his lungs, and was too weak for chemo,he moved to a hospice on 19th October and 4 days later I lost him.
I don’t blame cancer research for not doing anything, I blame the hospital for sending him every time he had an appointment and not doing anything, all they had to do was a biopsy as they could see how bad it was and still didn’t do anything until it was too late.
I don’t blame CRUK, but the young nurse who would sit with my dad and read to him, who gave him a shave in the mornings, who sat with him and held his hand when he was scared got paid a pittance, yet a CEO of a charity gets paid a quarter of a million a year as well as a bonus that could well be in the millions as far as we know, does not feel right.
Nobody who works for a charity should be getting rich from the donations that are made to it, well that’s what I believe anyway, and I still can’t find out what they have actually done with the billions raised over the years.
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Hiya,
The only part I feel semi-qualified to answer is
All drugs are assessed for clinical effectiveness and cost effectiveness, and there’s this thing called the ‘cancer drugs fund’, which helps make cancer drugs available. Most (I have no stats) cancer drugs do get approved.
Pharma companies make big profits, and they can actually make their drugs available at lower prices, and often do, thanks to the NHS acquiring drugs as one organisation (so that the cost is the same for every trust).
I think that the problems are that cancer is on the rise because of the terrible pollutants in the environment and the crap food that is made available, and screening in primary care is below par.
Meanwhile, heart disease, which is another of the biggest killers, is also being missed in primary care.
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