Waging War on War Metaphors in Cancer and COVID-19

摘要

As oncologists, we are all too familiar with the use of war metaphors in clinical practice, which dates at least as far back as President Richard Nixon’s declaration of a “War on Cancer” via the National Cancer Act in 1971, when he referred to cancer as a “relentless and insidious enemy.”1,2 The war on cancer, although it has been slow, has been successful; the age-adjusted mortality rate for invasive cancers in the United States has decreased by at least 23% in the 40 years since Nixon’s declaration,3 with similar improvements seen in high-income countries around the world.4,5 Perhaps in response to this call to arms and advances that followed, war metaphors have steadily made their way into the lexicon of oncology practice.