iCancer represents a team of guerrilla fundraisers
who have launched a global campaign to fund research into a potential treatment
for cancer (the kind that killed Steve Jobs). To find out more about the
campaign, watch the campaign video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X7W-52AwmH4
and read about iCancer below (information from http://icancer.org.uk/).
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The potential therapy, a cancer-busting virus,
which if successfully developed could significantly extend the lives of
patients with the same cancer as Steve Jobs, is currently sitting in a
freezer in Sweden – but it can’t be tested for lack of just £2million.
Without the money, the research will cease and the
virus will be thrown away, placing in jeopardy a therapy that could
significantly extend the lives of thousands of NET cancer sufferers.
We’ve put this campaign together in a little over a
week. We have no money behind us and everybody is volunteering their time for
free. So there is no fancy website, now motivational wristband and no rock
concert.
It’s just us, the scientists, the virus and you.
The campaign is led by author Alexander Masters who
wrote the bestseller Stuart: A Life Backwards and Dominic Nutt, who has
the same cancer as Steve Jobs. Masters took up the campaign when his close
friend Dido Davies was diagnosed with the incurable cancer, known as a
neuroendocrine tumour, or NET.
NETs
are cancers of the neuroendocrine system which incorporate glands that produce
insulin, adrenalin and the ‘happy hormone’ serotonin. They can appear all over
the body. NETs are silent killers. Most don’t have any symptoms – until the
cancer is critically advanced.
But there is a new potential treatment for NETs – a
cancer which is on the increase – but big business won’t stump up the £2million
needed to fund the first stage of trials, because at this early stage there is
no money to be made. The Swedish research team, led by Prof Magnus Essand, is
so keen to collaborate and share his findings, he published his research. But
now it is out in the public domain it can’t be protected by a patent and make a
profit.
But we want to put people before profit and bring
this potential therapy to people.
Fellow iCancer campaigner and social media expert Liz Scarff said: “We are appealing direct
to the people. We are mavericks taking this to our Twitter communities across
the world. We are cutting out the middlemen and the
“Steve Jobs would not have given up. He would have
found a way round the problem. That’s what we’re doing. As Steve Jobs said: ‘Being
the richest man in the cemetery doesn’t matter to me. Going to bed at night
saying we’ve done something wonderful…that’s what matters to me.’
There has been a huge and unexplained increase in
the incidence of NET cancers in recent years, of up to 500 per cent, according
to some research papers. In the case of Steve Jobs it was reported that he died
of pancreatic cancer – although in fact he had a NET tumour on his pancreas.
The virus’ creator, Prof Magnus Essand of Uppsala
University, says the £2million will bring the virus to the point where a
big pharmaceuticals company can take it over, test it, patent it, bring it to
full-scale development and make a profit.
“The virus may have a similar relationship with a
NET patient as drugs have with diabetics or patients with heart disease.
Insulin doesn’t cure diabetes, but it manages it so that a diabetic doesn’t die
from lack of insulin. Cancer, too, is becoming a chronic disease, which, even
when incurable, can be controlled for long periods of time. If we get this
right, virus treatments may have huge
For
more information on NETs and help and support please visit the NET Patient Foundation.
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To support the campaign,
follow @iCancer on Twitter
and tweet details about the campaign using #iCancer. You can donate
from £2 using links to the Indiegogo
site, the Twitter feed, the Facebook page
and YouTube.
Please give generously!
Just think, £2 is basically a cup of coffee! If a million people gave just £2
each, that’s it!
Blessings!
Ronell x
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