Dr. David Fajgenbaum couldn't wait for someone else to come up with a treatment for Castleman disease, the rare autoimmune disorder he was diagnosed with during his third year in medical school.
Fajgenbaum, 34, was hospitalized four times due to the disease, which caused his immune system to attack his organs. He had to go through chemotherapy in order to survive, and he came so close to death that a doctor once told him to write down his living will. "You learn a lot by almost dying," he told CNN.
Fajgenbaum's mother died of cancer while he was in college, and wanting to find a treatment in her honor, he studied at Oxford so he could learn how to conduct scientific research. Upon enrolling in medical school at the University of Pennsylvania, he decided he would become an oncologist. That changed after Fajgenbaum's diagnosis and his most harrowing hospitalization, six years ago. At the time, he noticed there were red spots on his skin, and when he questioned his doctors, they said they were nothing.
Once he recovered and graduated from med school, he formed the Castleman Disease Collaborative Network, inviting the best doctors and researchers to work with him. They needed to come up with some sort of a treatment, he decided, and fast. While looking at his medical charts, Fajgenbaum saw that a protein known as VEGF spiked every time he had a flareup of his disease. This protein controls the growth of blood vessels and gets the immune system going, and he wondered if this was linked to the red spots once on his skin. He asked his doctor to prescribe an immunosuppressant, and that did the trick — he's been in remission for five years. Now married, a new father, and a medical professor at the University of Pennsylvania, Fajgenbaum is thrilled to see the treatment working on other patients. Catherine Garcia
Talks between Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro's government and the country's opposition party are officially done, six weeks after Maduro's representatives stopped attending the discussions.
Opposition leader Juan Guaidó made the announcement on Sunday. The talks, mediated by Norway and held in Barbados, were called as a way to try to end the escalating political crisis engulfing Venezuela. Millions of people have left the country, due to poverty, inflation, and food and medicine shortages. Guaidó, the leader of Venezuela's National Assembly, said Maduro was not fairly elected in 2018, and he is the legitimate president, an assertion backed by the United States and dozens of other countries.
The opposition tried to launch a military uprising in the spring, but it failed, and Maduro has retained power, refusing to step down. In August, his representatives left the talks, citing President Trump's new sanctions against the country. When talks were still taking place, the opposition called for a new, free election, but Maduro's representatives would not even broach the subject, Reuters reports. Catherine Garcia
No deal was reached on Sunday between the United Auto Workers and General Motors, resulting in about 49,000 union members going on strike at midnight Monday.
This is the first national UAW strike since 2007, and was authorized Sunday morning in Detroit during a UAW meeting of regional leaders. The UAW said it is asking for more affordable health care, fair wages, and profit sharing, and could not reach an agreement with GM. "We stood up for General Motors when they needed us most," UAW Vice President Terry Dittes said in a statement. "Now we are standing together in unity and solidarity for our members, their families, and the communities where we work and live."
GM said it offered better health benefits and to create more than 5,400 new jobs, adding, "We have negotiated in good faith and with a sense of urgency. Our goal remains to build a strong future for our employees and our business." Contract talks will start back up again Monday morning, UAW spokesman Brian Rothenberg said. Catherine Garcia
In his new memoir, former British Prime Minister David Cameron says he believes current Prime Minister Boris Johnson only backed Brexit because "it would help his political career."
Cameron is candid when it comes to sharing his feelings about Johnson and Michael Gove, a fellow Conservative Party member who served in Cameron's cabinet and is now chancellor to the Duchy of Lancaster. U.K.'s Sunday Times published an excerpt of the memoir, in which Cameron calls the men "ambassadors for the expert-trashing, truth-twisting age of populism" and accuses Gove of being disloyal to both him and Johnson.
Because the Conservative Party's manifesto committed to holding a referendum on the U.K.'s membership in the European Union, Cameron called for a vote in 2016. The Leave campaign won, with 52 percent of the vote compared to Remain's 48 percent. Cameron was in favor of remaining, and he says Johnson merely took the "lead on the Brexit side — so loaded with images of patriotism, independence, and romance — [so he] would become the darling of the party." Johnson, he continued, "risked an outcome he didn't believe in because it would help his political career."
Cameron, who resigned as prime minister shortly after the vote, told the Times on Saturday that he understands "some people will never forgive me" for calling the referendum. Liberal Democrat leader Jo Swinson is one of those people, saying Cameron "put the interests of the Conservative Party ahead of the national interest." Catherine Garcia