Everyone loves the idea of curing cancer.

It’s hopeful. It’s inspiring. It makes headlines.

But here’s the uncomfortable truth:

We are not going to cure cancer until we’re willing to talk honestly about what causes it.

And the reason we don’t talk about the causes?

Because they are inconvenient.

I’ve been treating chronic, complex health conditions for over 25 years.

And what I’ve learned—over and over again—is this universal truth:

You cannot cure something if you don’t know and address the cause.

Because of this, I always have my doubts about talk about curing cancer when I don’t hear any talk about the causes of cancer. That doesn't mean that these efforts aren’t doing something important, but it’s probably not what we think it is.

Everyone wants to cure cancer.
But curing a disease requires understanding and addressing its causes.

Why“Curing Cancer” Is the Easy Conversation

“Curing cancer” is a safe topic.

It’s emotional.

It’s fundable.

It sounds heroic.

Talking about why cancer develops?

That’s uncomfortable.

Because that conversation forces us to look at things like:

• Environmental toxin exposure

• Diet and lifestyle patterns

• Long-term physiological stress

• Chronic inflammation

• Metabolic dysfunction

• Immune system breakdown

• Hormonal disruption

Those aren’t fringe ideas.

They are each well documented causes in the medical literature.

But they don’t fit neatly into a pill, a procedure, or a sound bite.

We Already Know the Major Drivers of Cancer

Cancer doesn’t just appear out of nowhere.

In the vast majority of cases, it develops over years or decades in a body under chronic stress.

We see strong associations between cancer risk and:

• Repeated toxic exposures

• Persistent inflammation

• Blood sugar and insulin dysregulation

• Mitochondrial dysfunction

• Immune suppression

• Disrupted microbiomes

This isn’t speculation.

This is physiology.

Genes may increase risk—but genes are not destiny.

Genes load the gun.

Environment and physiology pull the trigger.

Why the System Avoids the Cause Conversation

Modern medicine is very good at intervention after diagnosis.

It’s much less comfortable talking about:

• Environmental contributors

• Lifestyle-driven disease processes

• Prevention

• Early systemic dysfunction

Because once you talk about causes, accountability becomes part of the picture.

And accountability is a lot harder to swallow than hope.

We’d rather donate lots of money to cure cancer, than have a real conversation about what is causing it.

So instead, we say things like:

• “Cancer is bad luck.”

• “Cancer is genetic.”

• “Cancer is complicated.”

Those statements aren’t completely wrong—but they aren’t completely true either.

Treatment Is Not the Same as Cure

Here’s a critical distinction:

Treating cancer is not the same as curing cancer.

A real cure requires more than killing cells.

It requires changing the conditions that created them.

Knowing the mechanism ≠ knowing the cause

Medicine often:

• Discovers a biochemical pathway

• Develops a drug to block that pathway.

• Calls that “understanding the disease”

But pathways are how disease expresses itself, not why it exists.

Blocking a pathway can:

• Reduce symptoms

• Slow progression

• Improve survival

It does not eliminate causation.

Why This Matters for Cancer (and Other Chronic Diseases)

Cancer, and as examples, autoimmune disease, neurodegeneration, metabolic disease—all share a critical feature:

They are not single-cause, single-pathogen illnesses.

They arise from:

• Environmental and metabolic inputs

• Immune dysregulation over time

• Long-term physiological stress

• Systemic imbalance

Trying to “cure” these diseases without addressing cause is like:

• Mopping the floor while the pipe is still leaking

You can keep mopping forever.

You will never fix the problem.

Humans have not cured a disease without understanding its cause.

What we have done is:

• Control symptoms

• Interrupt transmission

• Suppress manifestations

• Reduce mortality

True cures—eradication, permanence, prevention—only happen when cause is identified and addressed, even if the mechanism is incomplete at the time.

That has never changed.

And I do not believe that cancer will be the exception.

What a Real Path to Curing Cancer Would Look Like

If we were truly serious about curing cancer, the focus would shift upstream:

• Reducing toxic burden

• Treating inflammation before disease

• Identifying dysfunction earlier

• Supporting metabolic health

• Strengthening immune function

• Personalizing prevention strategies

This approach isn’t flashy.

It doesn’t make headlines.

It doesn’t make a lot of money.

But it’s how real cures are built.

We don’t lack research.

We don’t lack data.

And we don’t lack intelligence.

What we lack is the willingness to center the conversation on cause instead of cure.

Until we’re willing to confront and address the causes of cancer, we’ll keep managing it, treating it, and—hopefully—getting better at that.

But that is not the same as curing cancer.

And we shouldn’t confuse the two.

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