The international community of oncologists continues to gain importance in ASCO; one might suggest that ASCO’s name—the American Society of Clinical Oncology—does not adequately reflect its membership or its mission. ASCO is increasingly an international society with one-third of its more than 30,000 members representing over 100 countries other than the United States. More than one-half of the attendees at our Annual Meeting come to Chicago from outside the United States.

Moreover, globalization is very much a part of the practice of oncology. For many years, some of the most exciting presentations at the Annual Meeting have emerged from studies conducted abroad. Further advances in therapy continue to emerge from clinical trials which are conducted exclusively or at least in collaboration with oncologists and their patients from outside North America. This is hardly surprising to me as a pediatric oncologist. Pediatricians have been used to collaborating because of the rarity of the tumors that we treat; there is simply no alternative if we are to perform the kinds of randomized trials that are necessary to move the field forward. In the past decade, international collaboration has become the rule for pediatric oncology. Sharing ideas and resources in our studies has nurtured close professional relationships across countries and has enriched us all. It is a model for the kinds of international collaboration that are encouraged through ASCO and that will become more critical to the development of therapies for our patients, as molecular characterization of tumors and targets for therapy define ever smaller subsets of patients who might be eligible for trials of new targeted agents.

Not surprisingly, concerns of oncologists and their patients in other parts of the world should and have become an important priority for ASCO. The activities of the International Affairs Committee (now led by Chair Tanja Čufer, MD, PhD, with Chair-Elect David Khayat, MD, PhD, and ably staffed by Doug Pyle) represent key initiatives for us, and our international colleagues are represented on the Board of Directors by dedicated seats currently occupied by Eduardo Cazap, MD, PhD, and Frances Shepherd, MD. We are fortunate that these leaders are not shy in advocating for the issues of importance to the international community.

A number of activities coordinated through the International Affairs Committee are notable. At the recent Annual Meeting, I attended the reception for our International Development and Education Award (IDEA) recipients. This award pairs early-career oncologists in low- and middle-income countries with a mentor in the U.S. or Canada to build long-term mentoring relationships and also sponsors travel to the ASCO Annual Meeting. Twenty recipients were honored at the recent Annual Meeting along with four recipients of International Development and Education Awards in Palliative Care (IDEA-PC). Such awards and scholarships promote collaborations across international boundaries and assure the dissemination of knowledge and the development of young investigators who represent the future of our specialty. ASCO’s international affairs activities are highlighted on the ASCO website www.asco.org/international.

I am looking forward to the European Multidisciplinary Cancer Congress in Stockholm in September, where the joint ECCO/ASCO symposium will focus on improving the quality of delivered cancer care by tools and guidelines. This will be an important opportunity to exchange ideas on mechanisms for raising the quality of care for our patients. We will share ASCO’s Quality Oncology Practice Initiative (QOPI) and our plans for a Rapid Learning Oncology System, and we will learn some of the ideas being pursued by our European colleagues.

Of great concern now is the growing impact of cancer in the developing world. As highlighted during a press briefing at the ASCO Annual Meeting: “Each year, an estimated 7.6 million people die from cancer—more than from HIV/AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis combined. It is estimated that the incidence of cancer will continue to increase during the next decade, from 12.7 million annual cases in 2008 to more than 20 million by 2030, with the majority of new cases occurring in low- and middle-income countries.” A High-level Meeting on Non-Communicable Diseases (including cancer) has been scheduled by the UN General Assembly to take place in New York on September 19-20. In collaboration with other cancer organizations [notably the Union for International Cancer Control (UICC) and the American Cancer Society (ACS)], ASCO has been busy helping to shape this summit and to notify the Obama administration and policy makers of all countries of the importance of this summit.

Clearly there is much to be done, particularly in developing countries with insufficient resources, insufficient numbers of oncologists, and inadequate infrastructure in the face of the emerging epidemic of cancer. While we celebrate the great advances in our understanding of the molecular biology of cancer and the targeted therapies that are emerging from these investigations, we must remain cognizant of how remote such expensive advances must appear in underserved countries where “translation” of advances to the clinic is limited by the reality of what can practically be delivered.