What does the Cancer Community think of our Project?

Early in our project discussions we decided that we needed to get feedback on the use of consumer products like prebiotics and probiotics from people that have an interest in the treatment and prevention of cancers.

With this in mind our team consulted with Chris Bushby and Nikki Morris, the CEO and Deputy CEO of Big C, a prominent UK-based cancer charity, to gain some perspective on the ethics of cancer treatment/prevention. Since their inception in 1980, Big C have provided community care to those affected by cancer. Furthermore they provide substantial funding towards ground-breaking cancer research at the Norwich Research Park, as well as funding equipment for hospitals. In talking to Big C we hoped to learn if our project and approaches would be perceived as ethically appropriate, and where the long-term goals of creating a probiotic and prebiotic might lead.

At the start of the conversation it became apparent that we as a team had already made an ethical decision without having ever realised we had done so. Nikki pointed out that in choosing to create a product with the sole intention of helping as many people as possible, rather than to make money, we had already set out down an ethical path.

Interestingly, and rather reassuringly, there was less opposition to genetic engineering than we had expected. This can perhaps be seen as a reflection of evolving perspectives towards synthetic biology, GMOs and bioengineering. It is also a stark example of different values: genetic engineering of food is still controversial in Europe, however we have found that opinions may differ when the reasons for engineering are for the prevention of cancer. In short, we learned that society’s collective moral hierarchy may place preventing cancer above objecting to the genetic engineering of food plants.

We also discussed how our products would reach the public. Some of the moral and logistical dilemmas we explored were how to create equity of access, to ensure everyone who needs our product can get it. There were concerns that in the future we would be unable to gain traction without a government-backed scheme, or a large charitable component, and that such a wide-reaching scheme may only be supported if there was a cost-benefit to preventing cancer with our product over treating it on the NHS.

Finally we discussed how our products would translate globally. Whilst products such as probiotics are marketed and consumed in western cultures, this is not the case in all culture and countries. Going forward on a global scale would require investigating what foodstuff our products might be integrated into to adapt our technology for different global markets.