Via the Blogfather comes this story about a Harvard professor that is developing a medical lab on a piece of paper. [A longer story was presented by CNN.] No really. You put one drop of blood on the paper and a series of chemically treated layers along with comic book inks react to tell you....or your doctor....if you have any of a half a dozen medical problems.
Professor George Whitesides believes this simple deployment of complex technologies can be done for as little as $0.01 per test. Such a cheap test method would not only benefit the developed world.....consider how easy liver function tests might be if all you had to do was prick your finger, drop the blood on the test strip, take a photo of the results with your cell phone, and mail it to your doctor.....it would be a definite boon to the developing world where electricity and doctors to operate more complex laboratories are in short supply.
As Glenn Reynolds says when uncovering these miracles...."Faster, please."
[CynicMan!]
Then the lawyers will get involved. And the FDA will demand 15 years worth of testing. And there will be packaging requirements that will cost $15 per test strip. And there will be malpractice insurance.
The damned thing will cost $50 a piece and we won't be able to use it for 20 years.
Sigh.
[/CM]
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