35 Quotes by Harold E. Varmus

My ideal summer day was reading on the porch.

I begin with the premise that behavior is an incredibly important element in medicine. Peoples habits, their willingness to quit smoking, their willingness to take steps to avoid transmission of HIV, are all behavioral questions.

I'm used to being surrounded by really smart 22-year-old students who have no problem saying that something I suggested is not a very good idea.

Every cancer looks different. Every cancer has similarities to other cancers. And were trying to milk those differences and similarities to do a better job of predicting how things are going to work out and making new drugs.

Following graduation from Amherst, a Woodrow Wilson Fellowship enabled me to test the depth of my interest in literary scholarship by beginning graduate studies at Harvard University.

I had learned of Gertrude Stein's bon mot that medicine opened all doors. This prompted me, in different moods, to view my future life as literary psychiatrist, globe-trotting tropical disease specialist, or academic internist.

I had learned that science is a rewarding, active process of discovery, not the passive absorption of what others had discovered.

Tobacco, UV rays, viruses, heredity, and age are the main causes of cancer.

Anyone graduating from medical school in 1966 had first to fulfill military service before launching a career. Fiercely opposed to the Vietnam War, I sought to avoid it through an assignment to the Public Health Service.