Battling cancer and beyond

TOMMY THOMPSON has bowed out of the presidential race, but his call to end breast cancer by 2015 deserves a long political life.

"Three women in my family have been afflicted with cancer, including my daughter and my wife," Thompson, the former Republican governor of Wisconsin and federal secretary of Health and Human Services, said in July. "I am committed to deploying the vast resources of the United States toward the goal of ending breast cancer by 2015 just like President Kennedy committed our nation to the moon."

Not all presidents are visionaries, and some of the best ideas come from candidates who fall well short of the White House. Thompson barely made a blip in the presidential polls. But he did have an ambitious goal for cancer treatment, and he hoped to challenge the government and the private sector to meet it.

This isn't just a case of the personal being political. Thompson called for a "global fight," for America to restore its status as a world leader through the power of its medical breakthroughs. First the country would tackle breast cancer; then it would tackle other major cancers. A team of doctors, nurses, researchers, and breast cancer patients would make recommendations for funding research. The budget of the National Institutes of Health would be doubled to $56 billion, and 15 grants of $10 million each would be made to research centers doing seminal work.

Such an effort would shift the country away from being the world's policeman, and invest more resources into being the world's consulting physician.

Other presidential candidates should heed Thompson's call -- but refine his vision and its details. Ending breast cancer in eight years is unlikely given the medical complexities. But there is still great progress to be made.

"It's an exciting time," says Dr. Eric Winer, the director of the breast oncology center at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. He points to chances to reduce the number of breast cancer deaths and speed up the acquisition and use of knowledge. One challenge, he says, is devising ways to move research out of the lab and into doctors' offices where patients benefit. To encourage this, the nonprofit group Susan G. Komen for the Cure is creating a grant program to fund collaborations between laboratory and clinical investigators.

Another challenge is to erase disparities in care by ensuring that effective treatments reach as many women -- and the smaller number of men with breast cancer -- as possible.

So far, Iraq and terrorism have been the dominant issues in the presidential campaign. But in his brief bid, Thompson identified another battlefield where the United States needs to make strides. A president who recommits to the fight against cancer would also be recommitting the country to the larger fight to better the human lot.