Cancers have had extremely effective new treatments developed for in the last ten years.

Depending on the type of cancer, we now have cures or treatments that stave off death for years.

My wife has a rare type of cancer with not much research thrown at it, and even her type of cancer went from a median time of survival measured in months to several years.

Tooth regrowth is something I was really hoping for. I abused one of my molars. After years of efforts (repeated fillings, a crown) to stave off losing the tooth it finally had to come out last month. Now I'm waiting for the bone graft to "take" before getting an implant. I was hoping I'd waited long enough for tooth regrowth to become "a thing" but I have not.

(Should have taken better care of it when I was younger and not ignored the massive hole that was growing in it. Chalk it up to a bad dental experience as a child and 25+ years of avoiding dentists as a result...)

In the same boat as you, maybe less years behind you than I’d like to believe.

Just in case you need someone to, y’know, empathise with you.

I have a lot of people in my life who don’t understand why I don’t just go to the dentist

The anxiety about having actual problems with my tooth eventually overrode the anxiety about going to the dentist and I started going regularly (after a pause of 26 years).

I'm pleased that I found a good dentist and I've been able to overcome my anxiety. I recognize that I'm lucky in this regard.

I was also lucky in that, aside from this one problem tooth, my oral care regimen in my 26 years of not having regular dental care were sufficient to prevent any further issues. I expected to come out of that first checkup with massive problems (even though I'd never had any pain or issues) and I was pleasantly surprised.

All in all I think I'm very lucky. I tried to take care of my teeth on my own, and largely succeeded, but I do wish I'd taken care of this one problem tooth before it was too late.

I was reading your comment just as I was sat in the dentist office paying for my partner’s kid long due treatment. She was afraid of dentists and neglected treatment for too long but I took her to the same superb (and expensive) dentist I use for my own kids and she was happy and had everything done. Your comment reminded me why I do it. Thank you.

Similar story for me. My wife's dentist went up being mine, on her recommendation. That helped me tremendously with my anxiety.

After a few years of bad mental health, I do have several dental problems, including two badly chipped front teeth. Sadly, my local dentist isn't taking any new patients at the moment so I can't get them looked at even though I now want to. It would be good if I could regrow the teeth but I think it's going to end up being an expensive procedure :/

It would be wonderful if it were someday a routine treatment, but it feels like the technology is perpetually out of reach. If the tech ever does pan out I assume it will be decades until it reaches the masses. It's difficult to be optimistic.

i thought the first two have had huge improvements in the last decade?

HIV has become a manageable disease in my lifetime. The main issue today is access to medication as I understand it.

The first widespread cure for HIV could be in children - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44765981 - August 2025

One-and-done HIV protection in infants - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44736988 - July 2025

US FDA approves Gilead's twice-yearly injection for HIV prevention - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44312729 - June 2025

it might be slow exponential thing, 60 years of low to medium improvements in cancer, and hopefully suddenly a few big cracks to turn it into a chronic liveable condition (or maybe cure it).

there are more articles about advanced tumors being shrunk to nothing than before (based on my personal monitoring)

HIV prevention has been reduced to a twice a year shot given mainly to MSM. It's pretty damn close to the original goal of a vaccine.

+ Male birth control

+ Alzheimer’s cure

+ Hair regrowth

+ weight loss pills

...they were persistent vaporware or scams, then suddenly they were real and everywhere. Hopefully that happens for the others too?

> + weight loss pills

They've had those for decades. It's called meth.

Coffee and cigarettes for a safer but less effective solution.

Cigarettes are no way safer than small doses of amphetamines. Check where the name "Ritalin" came from!

Have we solved anything? /s

Cancer immunotherapy . Only works in a handful of cases

While a cure remains elusive, HIV treatment is now extremely effective. Antiretroviral shots can keep people symptom free indefinitely.

Cancer treatment varies by type of cancer but many have dramatically improved outcomes.

HIV/Aids have made huge progress and so did cancer. Also "cancer" isn't a single disease, they're quite different.

- hair regrowth

I find it interesting that we are closer to regrowing teeth than hair. At least there was human clinical test for TRG-035. Is it just cause hair transplant is "good enough" stopgap solution?

I think it's more that fixing teeth is largely about replicating a specific material with one-off procedures, whereas fixing hair is all about controlling a complex never-ending process that is linked to all sorts of factors.

Also, everyone has teeth issues, whereas hair issues are mostly limited to a subsection of the population (older males, and not even all of them).

> subsection of the population (older males, and not even all of them)

Those men will pay lot of money to get back their hair though.

If I not mistaken it was Bill Gates who said more money is spent in hair regrowth research compared to vaccine to prevent diseases like malaria which kills thousand of people.

I am confused by this comment about HIV/AIDS. Is it cynical? Are you confused why we have not "cured" HIV? I grew up during the AIDS Crisis. It was awful. People were dropping like flies. Today, you can be "technically" HIV positive, but test negative, give birth to HIV-negative children, and have unprotected sex (and not infect your partner). As far as I am concerned, the battle has been won. It is a miracle in my eyes.

HIV meds have a slew unpleasant but tolerable (certainly far superior to HIV itself) side effects, imo the battle isn't "won" until the treatment is entirely inconsequential.

That said, the progress has indeed been miraculous. A great example of the capabilities modern medicine.

Compared to the 1980s, HIV is a chronic manageable disease that does not even reduce your quality of life.

Plenty of cancers have become manageable with the advent of immunological treatments.

Tooth regrowth seems to be the most complicated of those three, which isn't even surprising, given that it is basically organ regeneration.