Is MD Anderson An Idea Or A Place?
By
Leonard Zwelling
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/07/28/opinion/jd-vance-nationalism.html
In this blistering editorial in The New York Times on Sunday, July 28, Farah Stockman contrasts the MAGA view of America as a homeland and the Democratic (and previous Republican) view that America is an idea. President Biden recently called America “the most powerful idea in the history of the world.” The current GOP views the United States as a Christian, nativist fortress to be defended from outsiders and those whose ancestors arrived after 1900. It is this “homeland” that will disengage from the greater world rather than use its powerful ideals and resources to further the cause of democracy in places like Ukraine.
This is quite remarkable given that the Republicans were the party of Ronald Reagan, one of the most eloquent spokesmen for America as an idea—a “shining city on a hill.”
These are stark contrasting views of what our future as a nation is to be. Will we continue to be the beacon of freedom in the world or turn inward and care only about our own preservation to the exclusion of all others reminiscent of ideas that sprouted in America before WWII in the 1930’s?
I believe the same dichotomy is currently taking place at MD Anderson.
If MD Anderson was anything over its 80 or so years, it was an idea. The idea was a pretty simple one: “research-driven patient care.” The differentiator of MD Anderson cancer care from all other cancer care was that it was bringing to the bedside the discoveries in its labs and from its clinical trials. It was the application of basic and clinical science to each individual patient for the benefit of that patient. “Making Cancer History” is a clever slogan and so is “whatever it takes,” but in research driven patient care we have the how (research) that defines the why (patient care) of MD Anderson.
I think that’s starting to slip.
The research prominence of Anderson has diminished under the last two administrations. In one case it was the drive to commercialization that undermined excellence. In the current administration, there just isn’t the scientific leadership or horsepower that used to make Anderson a touchstone in the cancer world. And I mean both basic and clinical research. There was a time in which every department chairman in Cancer Medicine was a world-famous clinical investigator. Is that currently the case? I think not.
I believe this latest iteration of research diminution is because so many of the leadership positions are filled by home-grown talent. This is not conducive to new ideas. It’s just like the MAGA Republicans who believe everything in America is by definition the best—American exceptionalism. It’s not and neither is every research leader at MD Anderson an international leader. They ought to be.
Spreading the clinical care of MD Anderson up to Austin and out to the Houston Area Locations is all well and good, but getting bigger is not getting better.
What is the Pisters plan to get better? Mendelsohn had one—“raising the bar”—improving the quality of clinical research and lab-based science. DePinho had one. He was going to cure five cancers in five years. Well, at least he had a plan. The current guy has no plan. He’s like a MAGA Republican looking inward for solutions. They are not to be found doing the same thing, in the same way, with the same people.
America is, indeed, an idea. So is MD Anderson. Great ideas need to be nurtured.
2 thoughts on “Is MD Anderson An Idea Or A Place?”
What a refreshing commentary on ideas v places! Having spent nearly 20 years at the Mayo Clinic, we were expected to live and practice one idea: the needs of the patient come first. That idea became and remains my core value as a physician. Likewise, we know several MD Anderson faculty and alums who all embrace the idea that science, expertise, and caring have allow MD Anderson start apart from so many centers. We hope that the idea overcomes the capitalism of care.
Yes. We hope!