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"Curing cancer," explained.
Interviews were recorded with Riverside. Go to https://bit.ly/Riverside_CLEO + code CLEO for 30% off any individual plan.

We’re not looking for a “cure for cancer” anymore. Cancer is hundreds of diseases, so we’re really in a multi front fight against all of them. Cancer is a problem for us today in a way it wasn’t for previous generations. But, luckily, we also have more and more ways to fight back.

I started this episode with endless questions: What is cancer? What causes it? How do we treat cancer? What are the symptoms? Why are some cancers easier to treat than others? Why is cancer so hard to cure? Why do so many people die of cancer?

What I found is an incredible, complex, inspiring effort to treat and stop an insidious killer. In this video, we dive deep into how we treat cancer today. But I also found that we may not be helping the greatest number of people we can.

In this episode of Huge If True, I want to make the case that while we have made enormous strides in the fight against cancer we have also largely ignored one of the single best ways to save the most lives.

If you’d like to support Huge If True, the best thing you can do is subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/cleoabram?sub_confirmation=1

Chapters:
00:00 Why do so many people get cancer?
02:06 What is cancer?
03:02 How do we treat cancer?
03:44 What is chemotherapy?
04:42 What is immunotherapy?
05:22 Thank you Riverside
06:27 How do we save more lives?
07:47 Does early detection save lives?
09:23 How do we detect cancer?
10:45 What are the downsides of cancer tests?
11:38 Why early cancer detection matter?
12:42 Can we cure cancer?

Sources and additional reading:
- Lifetime Risk of Developing or Dying From Cancer, American Cancer Association https://www.cancer.org/healthy/cancer-causes/general-info/lifetime-probability-of-developing-or-dying-from-cancer.html
- Crunching Numbers: What Cancer Screening Statistics Really Tell Us, National Cancer Institute https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/screening/research/what-screening-statistics-mean
- Cancer, Our World In Data https://ourworldindata.org/cancer
- A New Deal For Cancer, collected essays (including by Greg Simon) https://www.publicaffairsbooks.com/titles/abbe-r-gluck/a-new-deal-for-cancer/9781541700611/
- The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer, Siddhartha Mukherjee https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Emperor-of-All-Maladies/Siddhartha-Mukherjee/9781439170915
- How does cancer spread through the body? TED-Ed https://youtu.be/OcigJn8UJNQ
- Have We Discovered a Cure for Cancer... on Accident? SciShow https://youtu.be/e-V_MDVgISo
- What is cancer? City of Hope https://youtu.be/_N1Sk3aiSCE
- Why Don’t We All Have Cancer? VSauce https://youtu.be/Qja4z1HGDQo
- Why Blue Whales Don't Get Cancer, Kurzgesagt https://youtu.be/1AElONvi9WQ

Be featured in an episode - upload questions for me to answer! https://www.dropbox.com/request/Edocsb2kErpueQ7F9T1Q

You can find me on TikTok here for short, fun tech explainers: https://www.tiktok.com/@cleoabram
You can find me on Instagram here for more personal stories: https://www.instagram.com/cleoabram
You can find me on Twitter here for thoughts, threads and curated news: https://twitter.com/cleoabram

Bio:
Cleo Abram is an Emmy-nominated independent video journalist. On her show, Huge If True, Cleo explores complex technology topics with rigor and optimism, helping her audience understand the world around them and see positive futures they can help build. Before going independent, Cleo was a video producer for Vox. She wrote and directed episodes of Vox’s Netflix show, Explained, produced videos for Vox’s popular YouTube channel, was the host and senior producer of Vox’s first ever daily show, Answered, and was co-host and producer of Vox’s YouTube Originals show, Glad You Asked.

Vox: https://www.vox.com/authors/cleo-abram
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm10108242/

Music: Musicbed

Follow along for more episodes of Huge If True: https://www.youtube.com/cleoabram?sub_confirmation=1

—

Typically here I’d do a “joke down low” - a joke with a key word you can use in the comments. But… well… for obvious reasons, a joke about cancer didn’t seem right. So, how about we just use the word “check” in the comments to tell me you’re a real one :)

What if we could actually USE nuclear waste?
Check out Storyblocks and sign up here for great footage: https://storyblocks.com/cleoabram

Subscribe to support optimistic tech content: https://www.youtube.com/cleoabram?sub_confirmation=1

Watch Johnny’s explainer on nuclear power here - and subscribe to his channel! https://youtu.be/QzTgZ6kOEM8

Nuclear waste is scary. Maybe you’ve seen it as glowing green goop in The Simpsons, or as a radioactive threat on the news. Either way, you likely know it has been a major block to the use and improvement of nuclear power. Over the last few decades, experts, politicians and the public have had heated debates over what to do with this radioactive material created by nuclear power plants.

But what if there were a way to not just store nuclear waste, but actually USE it?

This video is about the effort to make electricity out of nuclear waste. Really. It turns out, we developed the tools to do this decades ago. This story is about a technology we left behind and the people who want to bring it back.

For this video, I had the privilege of visiting one of the largest and oldest research centers in the US, the Argonne National Laboratory. I’m incredibly grateful to the researchers and staff I met there, and for their time in showing me their work. I also had the opportunity to speak with representatives from Oklo, a company working on new forms of nuclear power, including recycling nuclear waste as fuel. One of the best parts of making Huge If True is meeting and learning from people pushing what we can do in the hopes of improving the world for everyone else.

Chapters:
00:00 Nuclear waste isn’t what I thought
02:21 How I got obsessed
03:27 How much energy is in nuclear waste?
05:31 Thank you Storyblocks!
06:20 How do you get electricity?
06:50 What is uranium?
07:28 How does a nuclear reaction work?
08:05 Why is nuclear waste dangerous?
08:40 What do we do with nuclear waste?
09:35 How do you make electricity from nuclear waste?
11:21 Why doesn’t the US reuse nuclear fuel?
12:20 Is recycling waste feasible?
13:41 What is Huge If True?

Corrections:
07:09 The number refers to the total number of nucleons (either a proton or a neutron) in the atom, not the neutrons alone. A U-235 atom contains 92 protons and 143 neutrons (an atomic mass of 235). The U-238 atom also has 92 protons but has 146 neutrons (an atomic mass of 238). I should have said these *differ* by the number of neutrons in the atom. Thanks to the commenters who pointed this out!

You can find me on TikTok here for short, fun tech explainers: https://www.tiktok.com/@cleoabram
You can find me on Instagram here for more personal stories: https://www.instagram.com/cleoabram
You can find me on Twitter here for thoughts, threads and curated news: https://twitter.com/cleoabram

Bio:
Cleo Abram is an Emmy-nominated independent video journalist. On her show, Huge If True, Cleo explores complex technology topics with rigor and optimism, helping her audience understand the world around them and see positive futures they can help build. Before going independent, Cleo was a video producer for Vox. She wrote and directed the Coding and Diamonds episodes of Vox’s Netflix show, Explained. She produced videos for Vox’s popular YouTube channel, was the host and senior producer of Vox’s first ever daily show, Answered, and was co-host and producer of Vox’s YouTube Originals show, Glad You Asked.

Additional reading and watching:
- Johnny’s video on nuclear power: https://youtu.be/QzTgZ6kOEM8
- My previous video for Vox on nuclear reactors shutting down: https://youtu.be/KC7YD98HixM
- “The Nuclear Waste Problem” by Wendover Productions: https://youtu.be/uU3kLBo_ruo
- “Nuclear Waste: What Do We Do With It?” by Sabine Hossenfelder: https://youtu.be/aDUvCLAp0uU
- “What Happens to Nuclear Waste?” by The Infographics Show: https://youtu.be/imsRLscqTW0
- “Nuclear Waste Is Manageable. We Just Have To Do It.” by Joe Scott https://youtu.be/96et8ZGsxJY
- “Finland Might Have Solved Nuclear Power’s Biggest Problem” by The B1M: https://youtu.be/kYpiK3W-g_0
- “The energy in nuclear waste could power the U.S. for 100 years, but the technology was never commercialized” CNBC https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/02/nuclear-waste-us-could-power-the-us-for-100-years.html
- “Nuclear Power Policy,” NRC 1977: https://www.nrc.gov/docs/ML1209/ML120960615.pdf

Vox: https://www.vox.com/authors/cleo-abram
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm10108242/

Gear I use:
Camera: Sony A7SIII
Lens: Sony 16–35 mm F2.8 GM and 35mm prime
Audio: Sennheiser SK AVX

Music: Musicbed + Tom Fox

—
Welcome to the joke down low:

Why did the light bulb fail his math quiz?
He wasn’t too bright.

Leave a comment with the word “bright” in it to let me know you’re a real one :)