Remove Disease and Non-Infectious Disease

[Weirdo]

The diseases described in pathfinder seem to all be infectious in that they are caused by contact with a carrier creature or contaminated food/water. This makes sense on one level given that PCs are more likely to be afflicted by infections. But thematically...

Should Remove Disease be able to cure things like cancer or heart disease?

What about conditions that are entirely inherited, like sickle-cell anemia?

[Devin O' the Dale]

I would say cure disease only works on the things in the back of the book in the DM section and made up "fake" diseases that don't exist in golarion.

[Claxon]

Sickle-cell anemia and cancer aren't covered in the rules.

Remove Disease certainly works on any disease listed as a disease in the rule book. As for other disease you want to import into the world, its up to you as a GM to decide how it affects those sort of things.

I might allow it on diseases that develop from living conditons (such as cancer or heart disease), but not diseases that are based on genetics.

[ohako]

Hmmm, it's not a bad idea.

And there are a couple of references to cancer in the form of tumors and the like, like tumor familiar for the alchemist.

I think that using remove disease against someone's class ability would be like dispel magic on something that can be brought back right away. remove disease might blow up a tumor familiar, but the alchemist certainly knows how to brew up another one without much trouble.

There are also references to genetic defects, primarily with the ogrekin monster. I think you'd need a spell similar to half-blood extraction to cure a genetic defect, rather than remove disease.