Les Jones

Tech > Steve Jobs' Pancreatic Cancer is a Bombshell - Why Isn't Anyone Paying Attention?

I'm amazed that people are blasé about the fact that Apple founder and CEO Steve Jobs had pancreatic cancer. This is terrible news for Jobs and Apple, and most people don't seem to realize how dire his situation is. Here's the casual mention in Ad Age.

So when Mr. Jobs catches a cold, Apple sneezes. And that's why the rumors and innuendo swirling about his health are particularly serious for Apple. It started with blogosphere buzz in June after Mr. Jobs -- who had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2004 -- appeared extremely thin, bordering on frail, while introducing the latest version of the iPhone.

You probably have friends and relatives who had cancer, got treatment, and lived for years or even decades. It's an increasingly common and happy outcome thanks to medical advances. The difference is that those people didn't have pancreatic cancer.

I know about pancreatic cancer because my friend James at work had it. That's when I learned that it is one of the especially bad cancers that people don't survive for long. According to Wikipedia 95% of pancreatic cancer victims die within five years of the initial diagnosis. Jobs was diagnosed with in 2004. It's now 2008. That's four years. It's unlikely he'll be alive in 2010.

Last week you may have heard that Randy Pausch, best known as the professor who gave the "Last Lecture," died. When he gave that lecture he knew he had pancreatic cancer and his days were numbered. He died less than two years after his initial diagnosis.

Steve Jobs is living on borrowed time. He's been fortunate to push his time out more than most. I wish him all the best. He created some of the best technology of his generation, and we won't have him much longer.