This is the Guardian. Cancer remains the leading cause of death worldwide, claiming the lives of roughly 10 million people each year.

But continuous advances in medical science mean we also know more than

ever about its causes and how to treat it. Only this month over 40,000 specialists gathered for the annual meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology to share research, discuss new treatments, and ultimately save lives.

So where are the biggest breakthroughs occurring? And could new drugs change the way we think about cancer forever?

From the Guardian, I'm Ian Sample and this is Science Weekly.

Andrew Gregory, you're the Guardian's Health Editor and you've been covering the American

Society of Clinical Oncology Conference in Chicago, the largest cancer research conference in the

world.

Give us a sense of what that meeting is like.

Yeah, it's a huge meeting and it's the largest cancer research conference in the world

because of the number of experts who attend, so about 42,000 oncologists, researchers and scientists arrived for this year's conference.

It takes place in a huge building called McCormick Place, which is settled on the shore of Lake Michigan, and it makes

for an incredible meeting place for all these people to discuss, to debate, to learn where they're making progress

and also where they need to make more progress in terms of cancer research.

And what were the kinds of treatments that caught your eye this

year? There were lots of things that stuck out, one in breast cancer, the

arrival of a new drug that basically reduces the risk of breast cancer coming back by a quarter.

We know breast cancer treatments now are very, very effective.

So the way the research world is going is now looking at what more can be

done to reduce recurrence in patients and then one in ovarian cancer where

they're looking at combinations of drugs.

So one of these drugs is very, very successful in ovarian cancer at the moment, but

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