Saltah'na
Chinese Canadian, or 75% Commie Bastard.
Member # 33
posted
*Before anyone gets medieval on me for posting such a topic on this forum, may I remind you that I'm talking about Medical Technology......*
Well, you would think that in the 24th Century, advanced medical science would have taken care of everything from Headaches to the Common Cold. Unfortunately for us, however, it appears that a majority of these medical problems will be with us for a very long time. Not because of the astounding number of recorded diseases and illnesses, but the bacteria and viruses that cause some of these diseases become more resistant to common antibiotics and vaccines......
Think about it...... Today in North American Hospitals, hospitals are fighting a losing war against the increasing numbers of drug-resistant bacteria and viruses. Diseases long thought to be dormant are beginning to rise again (ie. tuberculosis, influenza, polio, common bacteria). And existing diseases have developed ways to circumvent these so-called weapons that we use to defend the human race, drug-resistant tuberculosis one of the more recent examples. Has the common cold been eliminated yet? Nope. Can we hope to have it eliminated in the 24th Century? I really don't think so.......
------------------ I can resist anything....... Except Temptation
Then again, I read every so often, usually in Ripley's Believe It or Not, about people who live to a ripe old age without ever having had a cold. Perhaps they're resistant?
And with the Human Genome Project 1/4 completed, perhaps sometime soon we'll find a gene which helps us resist the common cold, and learn how to tweak it.
And then there's the coming Age of Nanomachines, tiny 'bots that could be injected inside a human body, and used for everything from suture repair to cleaning out clogged arteries, to... a substitute immune system?
------------------ "We shall not yield to you, nor to any man." -- Freak, The Mighty.
[This message has been edited by First of Two (edited September 23, 1999).]
posted
Assuming that nanotechnology lives up to even half of the predictions made about it, it's very likely that we won't even be homo sapiens anymore after its introduction on a wide scale. Should prove to be interesting times.
------------------ "And much of Madness, and more of Sin, and Horror the soul of the plot." -- The Conqueror Worm, by Edgar Allan Poe
------------------ "Let's make sure that history never forgets the name...Enterprise." Federation Starship Datalink - Yet another site based on the popularity of starships.
The First One
A lovely little thinker, but a bugger when he's pissed
Member # 35
posted
Of course, with Sol, any change from Homo sapiens is for the better. . . 8)
------------------ "The next time the workplace seems especially hectic, remind yourself it could be worse: you could have two-dozen sharp-toothed creatures chewing on your nipples." - James Lileks
posted
Actually, that wwas the official answer. Someone once asked GR about it, saying that baldness would have been cured by the 24th century. GR said that it's not that mankind couldn't cure it, it's that it would see no reason too. It wouldn't be important.
I thought that there were something like 78 strains of what we call a cold. And you can only catch each of them once.
And I thought that TB wasn't coming back because of it's immune to antibiotics, as that's not how we combat TB. It's coming back because less people are being immunised, dueto tabloid fear stories and complacency.
------------------ You know, when Comedy Central asked us to do a Thanksgiving episode, the first thought that went through my mind was, "Boy, I'd like to have sex with Jennifer Aniston."
posted
I was under the impression that the various cold viruses (viri?) were constantly mutating, thus making it possible for you to give someone your cold, then for them to give it right back to you, because it wouldn't be the sem virus anymore. This would make more than 78...
------------------ "I've colorized the moon." -Ted Turner, The Family Guy
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