I kept thinking about what Mary Lagana said the day she called to tell me her nephew was dying.

I've known Mary for more than 20 years, ever since her son played basketball for my husband at Monterey High. Her English, she says, is not so good; my Italian is worse. But we're women - wives, mothers, sisters, aunts. We understand each other well. She was calling to ask for my help.Three Christmases ago in the prime of his life, John Cosentino was told he had brain cancer, an aggressive, deadly tumor. John was lucky. His family adored him. And they could afford the best treatment money could buy.

Three surgeries later, he was gravely ill and running out of time. So they hired a jet and flew him to Houston, Texas, to Stanislaw Burzynski, a physician who for 18 years has treated thousands of cancer patients with promising but unverified results. His "anti-neo-plaston-ther-a-py" reportedly causes few or no negative side effects. But it has yet to win Food and Drug Administration approval, except for cases where conventional treatments (surgery, chemotherapy and radiation) have failed.

John's was such a case. And in Houston, his family began to hope again. The treatment appeared to be helping. Then suddenly, there was new fear: Burzynski got indicted on FDA charges that he illegally transported drugs across state lines. A conviction would shut down his clinic.

"If that happens," Mary said, "John and a lot of other people couldn't get the medicine. And it's the only thing keeping them alive."

Mary wanted me to write about Burzynski. If people knew what was going on, she said, they'd call, write, do whatever it takes to get the FDA to back off.

I wanted to write that story. But I decided against it for one reason: My husband is a cancer patient. We have no plans to seek treatment in Houston, for now. But I can't guarantee about tomorrow.

The Burzynski story ran last Sunday in the Monterey County Herald. It was written by Mary Barker, who combined skill and compassion to let the Cosentinos and two other families speak for themselves.

Mary Lagana, no doubt, was pleased to see the story, though it was too late to help her nephew. John Cosentino died Sept. 13. She still prays for the other families - the Tringalis, Harveys and others, for whom hope is still alive.

The day she called to ask for my help, I told her this was a complicated issue.

"On one hand," I said, "you have to feel for the patients and their families. On the other, you have to realize that as a society, we've appointed watchdogs, like the FDA, to protect us from quacks and prevent charlatans from preying on desperate people."

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Mary listened hard.

"Maybe for some people," she said, "it's - how do you say it -complicated? But for me, it's very simple."

Being around cancer does that to you, makes you clearer on what's right and wrong and what really matters. I kept thinking about what Mary said.

Finally, I realized she was right. It is simple. What's hard to understand about wanting more than anything to keep someone you love alive?

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