Maybe there is more to the actual story but the article provides zero support to the headline as per the the surgery being 'life-saving'. It is even referenced as a 'stupid decision' to have put it off.
Pancreatic cancer has a dismal 5-yr survival rate - much less a 'cure' rate. This feels like a tabloid-y headline given the apparent lack of reality behind that statement.
"Jobs sought to assure colleagues that he was not suffering from a more common -- and more deadly -- cancer of the pancreas."
Jobs: "I had a very rare form of pancreatic cancer called an islet cell neuroendocrine tumor, which represents about 1 percent of the total cases of pancreatic cancer diagnosed each year, and can be cured by surgical removal if diagnosed in time (mine was)."
If he really had an "islet cell neuroendocrine tumor" he really had the chance to live much longer than he lived, had he accepted the operation earlier. Note he also didn't have to lie in "mine was." It was diagnosed in time, but he waited with the operation the nine months.
Jobs had a rare form of the cancer, known as neuroendocrine cancer, which grows more slowly and is easier to treat, explains Leonard Saltz, acting chief of the gastrointestinal oncology service at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. "Survival for many years or even decades with endocrine cancer is not surprising." For that type, the sort that Jobs had, "survival is measured in years, as opposed to pancreatic cancer, which is measured in months."
Steve Jobs had an extremely rare form of pancreatic cancer that has a very good 5-yr survival rate if caught and treated early. The article is likely accurate.
Pancreatic cancer has a dismal 5-yr survival rate - much less a 'cure' rate. This feels like a tabloid-y headline given the apparent lack of reality behind that statement.