I would not want to live in a world without antibiotics or vaccines -- and it is worth remembering, too, that many people worried that the population would get too large if there weren't diseases to keep the population contained! However, the opposite tends to be true -- the more technology improves the standard of living and quality of care, the fewer children people choose to have because they have greater resources to limit their family size and more optimism about the present. Today, screening for genetic diseased...

Even GMOs have produced disease-resistant crops that can help famine-stricken regions to feed themselves. Technology has made AIDS a manageable ailment, not a death sentence. Some of even the most feared technologies have potential benefits that are too great to ignore. It is up to the patient to be an informed consumer of medical care; government cannot stringently dictate where medical science and technology will lead.