• Question: do you think the goverment under funds the research into cancer ?

    Asked by mdawestwood to Gioia, Iain, Jo, Leo, Mariam on 20 Jun 2010 in Categories: .
    • Photo: Mariam Orme

      Mariam Orme answered on 16 Jun 2010:

      It would be fantastic if there was more funding for research into cancer and for science in general. But at the moment, with the economic situation being so bad, I’m not sure what I would do if I were the government – it must be very hard to choose between giving more money to research or, for example, schools or hospitals. But I think that funding for science should have high priority because in the long term it’s good for the economy and for development. Actually the last government realised this, and was pretty good about funding science. We’ll have to see what happens with the new government…

    • Photo: Joanna Watson

      Joanna Watson answered on 16 Jun 2010:

      That’s a difficult question to answer because there are so many things that the money from taxes are used to pay for and so many diseases that need to be treated. Cancer research is important, but I’m not sure whether more tax money should be used to fund it. What do you think?

    • Photo: Gioia Cherubini

      Gioia Cherubini answered on 17 Jun 2010:

      To be honest, I would say that cancer research is the least under funded of the various fields of research.

    • Photo: Leo Garcia

      Leo Garcia answered on 20 Jun 2010:

      It is always desirable to have more funding for such an important field of research.

      However, this must be balanced with the other priorities of the budget, and other regions of science research. If the government, to pick an example at random, were to stop its renewal and upkeep of its nuclear weapons store, we would have significantly more money in our budget for genuinely important, life saving, pursuits like cancer research.

      I also think that scientists are generally under paid considering the importance of the job they perform – compared to, say, PR agents, footballers and rappers. But that’s just my opinion – perhaps you disagree!

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