Laukien Prize and consequences

This week, it was announced at the ENC in Florida, that I had been awarded the Laukien Prize. John Trail took this pic of Andrew Coy collecting the prize on my behalf in Florida.

More information about the prize can be found at
http://www.enc-conference.org/
and a youtube video of the presentation can be seen on

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zLcrKgDW4TE

This is a huge honour and should have been an occasion for celebration here at home. Unfortunately, due to an elementary error on my part, it turned into an embarrassing media outcome.
See
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/health/3599138/
Scientists-award-money-used-to-fight-cancer

After talking with the reporter for some time about MR, Magritek, and sensible stuff, and during a session with newspaper photographer and reporter, while I had my picture taken with the Magritek Rockcore analyser, I was asked by the reporter "so what will you do with the prize money?". I jested "I don't know-maybe spend some on medical expenses-cancer is a rich man's disease". It's a joke which Miang and I make around the home, part of the humour that keeps one going in the fight against cancer, but it slipped out. Fatal. The story went haywire once the editor heard about the remark, and coupled with my unwise openness in telling the reporter that I would be having Avastin treatment, they were able to connect their dots and create their story. Fair enough, even if wrong (I am expecting my insurance company to pay for the Avastin). Nobody's fault but my own.

I wrote a letter to the editor of the newspaper. They did print it on April 24, but of course, my 20 April story got syndicated and those readers will never see it. Hence, I am putting it on the blog for my friends

Letter to DomPost

"I did make the offhand remark “cancer is a rich man’s disease”, mostly in jest, and probably unwisely, in response to the question “what would I do with the Laukien prize money?”

What the DomPost story didn’t tell was how proud I feel to live in a country where a publicly-funded system provides high quality cancer treatment for all citizens based on need alone, to be cared for by highly-skilled professionals, to be given exceptional personal support from the Cancer Society.

Pharmac’s priorities are right. Avastin’s gains are small. But who would not want to take advantage of the best that medical science offers? And so, each patient must wrestle with issues of life extent and ability to pay.

To me, the important point is this. If New Zealand does not lift its prosperity, the gap between what our health system provides, and what medicine can offer, will widen, and these inequity issues will only get worse. We can lift prosperity by innovation through technology and science. If there is a connection between the Laukien Prize and cancer treatment, it is more about New Zealand science creating export business opportunities, than about one individual’s possible use of prize money.

Paul Callaghan