world ain't perfect wrote:
A Hunk wrote:I agree that physicians are typically intelligent and dedicated. Further, we can thank them them in part for eradicating, in this country, most of the diseases that have historically been life-ending/debilitating scourges..
I would instead thank more science and technology for the eradication of the awful life-ending/debilitating scourges.
I would also blame science for not getting the to bottom of the more complex diseases that we are confronted with. The profession has now become more of a rat race to gain publications rather than actually finding solutions to the healthcare problems we face.
I think physicians/medicine in emergency situations is the best thing we have and I am very grateful for that. Outside of emergency situations it is a bit of crap shoot as to whether you get good health care.
Yes of course 'science and technology' as well as improved sanitation efforts were a large part in improving the health of our population. I didn't mention those for the sake of brevity/obviousness.
You are presumably referring to the profession of biomedical research. While it's not a perfect system (nothing is), it certainly continues to make strides in understanding and finding cures for diseases. Unfortunately, biology is dizzingly complex, perhaps the most complex topic that exists. And, to find cures, the underlying biology of a disease is usually needs to be understood. The most common problems we have that are associated with aging, degeneration, immunosuppression, complex infection, etc are 1) difficult to study in a model system because they tend to unfold over many years, and 2) have only come into vogue recently (because medicine and science have increased people's life spans to the point where these types of diseases are common).