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by adastra22 1 day ago
What you are implicitly assuming is that the publication and review system matters for that cancer research. Cancer progress, as I understand, is mostly driven by NIH priorities, which are set by governmental review committees. Published work plays a part in that, but it is not the decentralized-review that is typical of other areas of research (e.g. psychology and Alzheimer's).

The peer review system as we know it today has only really existed for less than a century. It is no how science was traditionally done. It was adopted due to some real problems with the old system, so I'm not saying we should go back. But it's not clear either that unpaid peer-review is the ultimate end-state either.

100% agreement on your last paragraph though.