• Question: why choose to help cancer ? have you had family history ?

    Asked by hannah1996 to Wei on 13 Jun 2011.
    • Photo: Wei Xun

      Wei Xun answered on 13 Jun 2011:

      Hi Hannah:

      It just so happened that the first job I got after graduating was cancer related, and I had high ambition that I can help to cure cancer within my lifetime. However, now that I’m slightly more realistic and more is known about this group of diseases, I realised just how difficult and unattainable finding cures would be. So now I work to help to prevent people from getting cancer in the first place, by looking for causes that we can change relatively easily.

      Also cancer is certainly one of the biggest killers in a developed country like the UK: Cancer Research UK says one in 3 people will develop some form of cancer at some point in their lives, it is a very important health problem (http://info.cancerresearchuk.org/cancerstats/incidence/risk/). Since the time I went to university, 2 members of my close family have had cancer.

      BUT, I still think being ambitious is one of the best things about being young, you should never give up on something before you’ve tried it.

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