From Roger Taylor, Meols, Wirral, UK
Charles Swanton debates ditching the term “cancer” when referring to low-risk tumours (2 February, p 24). This is long overdue, and I would go further. It would be hard to imagine a less suitable name for a disease. Cancer is, after all, Latin for “the crab”, an unsettling creature with ferocious claws that scuttles about sideways in the debatable lands between the tides.
Given that the many diseases falling under this name will see off so many of us, and that an optimistic attitude is valuable in dealing with them, I cannot think of a single reason to terrify people with it. If we used the term “metastatic disease”, we could lose the equally alarming “battling”. After all, no one battles high blood pressure or heart disease. Of the people I know who have had cancer, none has conjured up the image of someone launching an assault in clanking armour on a fantasy monster. They have just done their damnedest to get on with their ordinary lives.
