This is an important reminder to us all, or at least it was to me, to do what we can, no matter how small or insignificant what we do seems. It takes a lot of effort, a lot of money and a lot of different people working in different capacities to bring about even slow progress. Some of the early experimental leukemia treatments must have been an absolute nightmare for parents to witness.Įpisode one also focused on the philanthropy work of Mary Lasker. Cancer and shame do still go together, even in our modern society, and yes, even in the US to some degree.Įpisode one was an emotional segment to watch because of the intense focus on children enduring childhood leukemia and unimaginable harsh treatments on their fragile bodies. Sadly, even today shunning still happens in parts of the world. The shunning of cancer patients, which went on for years, largely due to that fear and an incomplete understanding of cancer, was well depicted in this episode.
Can you imagine?Įpisode one began by calling cancer a world-wide scourge a disease also referred to as The King of Terrors, A Hidden Assassin and most recently, The Emperor of All Maladies. It was fascinating to realize that cancer has been around as long as mankind and how in the beginning there was no treatment at all. Sidney Farber, I couldn’t help but think about all the researchers who have worked so incredibly hard to make painstakingly slow progress, and of course how patients have suffered through brutal cancer treatments. While watching the condensed cancer history lesson, which focused heavily on the work of Dr. Episode OneĮpisode one of the documentary, “Magic Bullets,” was mesmerizing. It is the combined stories of cancer researchers, physicians, politicians, advocates, patients, philanthropists and of course, cancer itself.įinding answers to cancer requires us to closely look at, listen to, and analyze all the various cancer angle stories. If I were to summarize this documentary in a sentence or two, it would be that it’s a conglomerate of stories. However, I totally understand why some opt out of watching or reading about cancer anything. I am one of those people who does watch TV shows and movies about cancer. I had been looking forward to watching this PBS documentary ever since I heard about it. I’ve become a very slow reader, and yes, I do attribute this in part to my cancer treatment. It took me a long time to get through it. I read the book a couple years ago and thought it was very good, though I did take many breaks and read and re-read sections at times. A while back, Dear Hubby and I sat down to watch the PBS documentary – Ken Burns Presents, Cancer: The Emperor of All Maladies, a film by Barak Goodman, based on the 2010 Pulitzer-Prize winning book, The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer, by Siddhartha Mukherjee.
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