Why do some people die of leukemia and others don’t?

Answer

Leukemia is a form of blood cancer in which the number of white blood cells in our body increases enormously. This ‘overproduction’ takes place in our bone marrow and the white blood cells, which normally mature in the bone marrow and only then enter the blood, are released much too early. Now you have different types of white blood cells and that already determines your chance of surviving leukemia. The probability of dying is very high in certain species, lower in others. Your age also plays a role: the chance of survival from leukemia is greater in children than in adults. Newborn babies with Down syndrome are also more likely to get leukemia immediately after birth, but this often clears up on its own (this is not referred to as true leukaemia, but as a ‘leukemoid reaction’).

Leukemia is not limited to the blood alone, but after a while also penetrates other organs (liver, spleen, brain, etc.). If your leukemia is detected early, when it is only in the blood, you have a better chance of being cured than if your leukemia is detected late and other organs are also affected. There are therefore various elements that determine the chance of survival: type of leukemia, age of the patient, stage at which it is discovered, etc. Finally, it is believed that it is also genetically determined how well you will respond to a treatment.