I've been away for quite a while from this site due to my life becoming a complete clusterfuck of work, school, and family obligations. One of the things keeping me busy was the fact that I started my PhD candidacy at a top research university (United States). I have been working in a lab which receives grants from the United States government, the University, and private organizations to research specific kinds of cancer and start ground-level research into treatment methods. Usually our work gets shipped out to other research centers or pharmaceutical companies once we lay the blueprint for potential treatment. Until recently, we had been receiving funding for specific types of cancer that the money was specifically earmarked to. This changed though, and now we simply have a "general fund" to use at our discretion.
I petitioned the research board to shift all of our funding towards general and male-only cancer types and found out recently that I got my wish. We are no longer researching cervical, ovarian, breast, or (for some reason, not my plan) colon cancer. Most of the money used to fund those is now going towards testicular and prostate cancer as I rightly convinced our board that those types of cancer are completely underfunded and glossed over by other publicly funded labs. As we are only one lab, this likely doesn't make a huge difference in the overall scheme of things. I just thought I would share that I am fighting silently for men around the world to get the treatment they deserve, as male-specific cancer research is chronically underfunded around the world. The thought that I might also delay progress on female-specific cancer types that are directly correlated to being HPV positive is just a cherry on top of things.
I probably won't respond much and I'm sorry if I posted this in the wrong place, but I thought I would share.
I petitioned the research board to shift all of our funding towards general and male-only cancer types and found out recently that I got my wish. We are no longer researching cervical, ovarian, breast, or (for some reason, not my plan) colon cancer. Most of the money used to fund those is now going towards testicular and prostate cancer as I rightly convinced our board that those types of cancer are completely underfunded and glossed over by other publicly funded labs. As we are only one lab, this likely doesn't make a huge difference in the overall scheme of things. I just thought I would share that I am fighting silently for men around the world to get the treatment they deserve, as male-specific cancer research is chronically underfunded around the world. The thought that I might also delay progress on female-specific cancer types that are directly correlated to being HPV positive is just a cherry on top of things.
I probably won't respond much and I'm sorry if I posted this in the wrong place, but I thought I would share.
