CBH Talk | Transforming Cancer Survival for All: A Conversation with Bruce Ratner and Errol Louis
Despite tens of billions of dollars spent on research and treatment, cancer remains the number two killer in the United States. Not surprisingly, it’s people of color, along with poor and rural patients, who die from this disease the most.
In his book, Early Detection: Catching Cancer When It’s Curable, Bruce Ratner makes a passionate argument that the disparity in death rates and the overall rates themselves can be drastically and meaningfully reduced with a simple strategy – early detection screenings.
Ratner, along with co-author Adam Bonislawski, point to the success of tests like Pap smears, colonoscopies, and mammograms, all standard practice health care that detect malignancies before symptoms develop and before it’s too late.
But why just these standard early detection practices? Why instead do we devote the vast majority of resources to relatively ineffective late stage treatments? And how can we address the social justice dimensions of cancer, and bring life saving change to all Americans?
Join Ratner for an eye-opening discussion about this urgent - and most importantly - fixable, issue. He is led in conversation by NY1 News political anchor Errol Louis.
Presented in connection with 2024 National Black Cancer Awareness Week
Participants
In his long career, Bruce Ratner served as New York City’s Commissioner of Consumer Affairs, an NYU law professor and the founder, chairman, and CEO of Forest City Ratner Companies, a major property developer. He led the economic revival of Downtown Brooklyn, built the Barclays Center arena, brought the Nets NBA basketball franchise to Brooklyn, and helped restore Times Square, including building The New York Times headquarters.
For more than two decades, Mr. Ratner has applied his deep interest and background in the sciences by serving on the boards of Weill Cornell Medicine, the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. He also founded the Michael D. Ratner Center for Early Detection of Cancer, in memory of his brother, to advance the cause of expanding the adoption of life-saving cancer screening and research into new diagnostic tests. Through the center, Mr. Ratner has promoted early detection testing for lung cancer, particularly in low income and underserved populations.
Mr. Ratner is also Chairman of the Museum of Jewish Heritage – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust. He was founding chairman of the New York City Parks Foundation and, for a decade, served as chairman of the board at the Brooklyn Academy of Music.
Errol Louis is the Political Anchor of NY1 News, where he hosts Inside City Hall, a nightly prime-time show about New York City politics, featuring interviews with top political and cultural leaders. He is also the host of the weekly podcast You Decide with Errol Louis. Louis has moderated dozens of debates between candidates for Mayor, Governor, Public advocate, city and state Comptroller, state Attorney General, Congress and U.S. Senate. He is a longtime CNN Contributor, providing on-air commentary on key events including presidential primaries and Election Night. He writes regularly for CNN.com, as well as a weekly column for New York Magazine on a range of political and social affairs.
Despite tens of billions of dollars spent on research and treatment, cancer remains the number two killer in the United States. Not surprisingly, it’s people of color, along with poor and rural patients, who die from this disease the most.
In his book, Early Detection: Catching Cancer When It’s Curable, Bruce Ratner makes a passionate argument that the disparity in death rates and the overall rates themselves can be drastically and meaningfully reduced with a simple strategy – early detection screenings.
Ratner, along with co-author Adam Bonislawski, point to the success of tests like Pap smears, colonoscopies, and mammograms, all standard practice health care that detect malignancies before symptoms develop and before it’s too late.
But why just these standard early detection practices? Why instead do we devote the vast majority of resources to relatively ineffective late stage treatments? And how can we address the social justice dimensions of cancer, and bring life saving change to all Americans?
Join Ratner for an eye-opening discussion about this urgent - and most importantly - fixable, issue. He is led in conversation by NY1 News political anchor Errol Louis.
Presented in connection with 2024 National Black Cancer Awareness Week
Participants
In his long career, Bruce Ratner served as New York City’s Commissioner of Consumer Affairs, an NYU law professor and the founder, chairman, and CEO of Forest City Ratner Companies, a major property developer. He led the economic revival of Downtown Brooklyn, built the Barclays Center arena, brought the Nets NBA basketball franchise to Brooklyn, and helped restore Times Square, including building The New York Times headquarters.
For more than two decades, Mr. Ratner has applied his deep interest and background in the sciences by serving on the boards of Weill Cornell Medicine, the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory. He also founded the Michael D. Ratner Center for Early Detection of Cancer, in memory of his brother, to advance the cause of expanding the adoption of life-saving cancer screening and research into new diagnostic tests. Through the center, Mr. Ratner has promoted early detection testing for lung cancer, particularly in low income and underserved populations.
Mr. Ratner is also Chairman of the Museum of Jewish Heritage – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust. He was founding chairman of the New York City Parks Foundation and, for a decade, served as chairman of the board at the Brooklyn Academy of Music.
Errol Louis is the Political Anchor of NY1 News, where he hosts Inside City Hall, a nightly prime-time show about New York City politics, featuring interviews with top political and cultural leaders. He is also the host of the weekly podcast You Decide with Errol Louis. Louis has moderated dozens of debates between candidates for Mayor, Governor, Public advocate, city and state Comptroller, state Attorney General, Congress and U.S. Senate. He is a longtime CNN Contributor, providing on-air commentary on key events including presidential primaries and Election Night. He writes regularly for CNN.com, as well as a weekly column for New York Magazine on a range of political and social affairs.