With your MDS you aren’t able to produce enough red blood cells. Aransep, developed for patients with anemia to increase their red blood count is helping you keep your hemaglobin count close to normal. So far, if you’re not requiring any treatment for MDS since 2014 other than the Aransep, it appears to me that you’re pretty stable with the disease.

From personal experience I know that there is a huge amount of research being done for conditions like MDS and AML, to name only a couple. I don’t know what form of leukemia your friend has had for 20 years but there are some forms of chronic leukemias that develop much slower than others, some never requiring treatment or are in an active surveillance program.
But there is a vast amount of research in this field. I can provide you with a large list of current research papers if you’re interested. My own transplant doctor is continually researching and publishing papers and running clinical trials. He’s just one of thousands of doctors and researchers globally, along with big pharma, helping to find treatments and cures for leukemia. These are complicated cancers with no simple fixes.