Pledge of Allegiance and Invocation
Bob Hortop lead the pledge of allegiance. Burlingame Rotarian Michael Kimball was surprised to find that he would be giving the invocation. After a startled stare Mr. Kimball satisfied our salient senses by surprising us with superior thoughts.
Guests and Visiting Rotarians
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Tom Brady was the guest of Joe Galligan. Joe also introduced his lovely wife Helen, and the speaker for the day, son Dr. Derek Galligan. It was clear this was a family affair when Joe also introduced Helen's daughter, Tricia Walworth. Charles Voltz was delighted to introduce his life partner, Mary Hunt. Tom and Faye Dowdy were also guesting. Visiting from Millbrae Rotary was Millbrae Past President Robert Gottschalk. Mike Harvey was visiting....wait....of course he's a member of Burlingame Rotary we just haven't seen him in a while. Nice to see you, Mr. Harvey.
Announcements
Dennis Zell gave a brief recap of last weeks Little Big Game fun meeting at Lion's Hall. Although it was a low turn out for Burlingame Rotarians those who did turn up had a fun time - and we were delighted to hear that Burlingame won against San Mateo. Suzanne Juptner reminded us that the Rotary Fun Faries party is coming up on the 16th and hopes to see you there.
Dennis Zell stepped up to the podium for the second time to deliver the Newscast. Turnout was low - which he called electile dysfunction. In his own lighthearted way, he gave us results of local and national elections and particularly one of our own, Mr. Ricardo Ortiz who was re-elected Mayor of Burlingame. Congratulations, Ricardo.
Program
Our own Joe Galligan introduced Dr. Derek Galligan our speaker for the day. Of course, it was an amazing introduction from a very proud dad, and rightly so, Joe. Dr. Galligan educated us about advances in immunotherapies for cancer starting with 'what cancer is' and how we have dealt with it in the past, and how in the last 5 years there has been a big shift in how we deal with cancer. Taking us through how cells mutate and how the body's immune system notices the cancer cells and attempts to kill them. When the body fails the mutation gets passed and historically doctors have used surgery to cut it out. But surgery didn't always work so chemotherapy was used to target fast-growing cancer cells and the consequences were not always good. Dr. Galligan gave us a fascinating history of leukemia beginning with the father of immunology, Sydney Farber who worked in the early 20th century to cure leukemia. Nowadays leukemia can be cured in 90% of cases. He described how bone marrow transplants have been super successful at curing leukemia, although not without the problems of donors and complications after transplant. It wasn't until recently that scientists discovered that the immune system was connected to a cure for cancer. Today T-cells approved by the FDA are now being 'taught' how to kills cancer cells and then put back in the body to do their work. The downsides are that this treatment is not available for all cancers, not everyone responds and some patients have relapsed. But CAR T-Cell Therapy (Chimeric Antigen Receptor) is achieving an 80-90% remission rate. What can you do? Dr. Derek Galligan asked us to go to www.bethematch.org and register - you might be a match that saves someone's life. After some great questions from the audience that showed that everyone had been mesmerized by this young doctor's presentation, we want to take a moment and congratulation fellow Rotarian Joe Galligan for having such an amazing son and thank Dr. Galligan for all that he, and his UCSF team is doing to pioneer a cure for this dreaded disease. Thank you, Dr. Derek Galligan. Meeting Photos
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