“IF MY CANCER SPREADS, THEY’LL LET ME USE HERCEPTIN.”

“IF MY CANCER SPREADS, THEY’LL LET ME USE HERCEPTIN.” In early 2005, we ran into a wonderful neighbor of ours on a walk. She had news. She had breast cancer. The bad news was that it was aggressive. The good news was that the tumor was vulnerable to herceptin. BUT she couldn’t have herceptin because her cancer hadn’t spread. (Herceptin had been used for some years for advanced cancer, but the the tests had not been done to prove its effectiveness at early stages, before the cancer spread). Our friend said cheerfully and bravely, “Well, if my cancer spreads they’ll let me use herceptin.” As Virginia Postrel recounts, in May 2005, the dramatic results were announced of the time-consuming tests which showed the effectiveness of herceptin against her kind of cancer before it spread. A Bayesian should wonder why the evidence that herceptin worked on that kind of cancer after it spread hadn’t been enough to warrant using it on that kind of cancer before it spread. I feel for those ladies who had that kind of early-stage breast cancer and had to wait until the tests were completed to prove that what worked after a cancer spread would also work before it spread.