The Rise and Fall of Modern Medicine : Revised Edition

In the years following World War II, medicine won major battles against smallpox, diphtheria, and polio. In the same period it also produced treatments to control the progress of Parkinson's, rheumatoid arthritis, and schizophrenia. It made realities of open-heart surgery, organ transplants, test-tube babies. Unquestionably, the medical accomplishments of the postwar years stand at the forefront of human endeavor, yet progress in recent decades has slowed nearly to a halt. In this judicious examination of medicine in our times, which has won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, medical doctor and columnist James Le Fanu both surveys the glories of medicine in the postwar years and analyzes the factors that for the past twenty-five years have increasingly widened the gulf between achievement and advancement: the social theories of medicine, ethical issues, and political debates over health care that have hobbled the development of vaccines and discovery of new "miracle" cures. While fully demonstrating the extraordinary progress effected by medical research in the latter half of the twentieth century, Le Fanu also identifies the perils that confront medicine in the twenty-first century. "[From] a respected science writer . . . important information that . . . has been overlooked or ignored by many physicians." —New Republic "Provocative and engrossing and informative." —Houston Chronicle In the years following World War II, medicine won major battles against smallpox, diphtheria, and polio. In the same period it also produced treatments to control the progress of Parkinson's, rheumatoid arthritis, and schizophrenia. It made realities of open-heart surgery, organ transplants, test-tube babies. Unquestionably, the medical accomplishments of the postwar years stand at the forefront of human endeavor, yet progress in recent decades has slowed nearly to a halt. In this judicious examination of medicine in our times, which has won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, medical doctor and columnist James Le Fanu both surveys the glories of medicine in the postwar years and analyzes the factors that for the past twenty-five years have increasingly widened the gulf between achievement and advancement: the social theories of medicine, ethical issues, and political debates over health care that have hobbled the development of vaccines and discovery of new "miracle" cures. While fully demonstrating the extraordinary progress effected by medical research in the latter half of the twentieth century, Le Fanu also identifies the perils that confront medicine in the twenty-first. 16 pages of black-and-white photographs add to what the Los Angeles Times cited as "a sobering, contrarian challenge" to the "nostrum of medicine as a never-ending font of 'miracle cures'." "[From] a respected science writer ... important information that ... has been overlooked or ignored by many physicians."'New Republic "Provocative and engrossing and informative."'Houston Chronicle "Marvelously written, meticulously researched ... one of the most thought-provoking and important works to appear in recent years."'Choice In the three decades after World War II, medical discovery advanced at an unprecedented rate : polio and diptheria were conquered by vaccines and treatments were developed to control the effects of Parkinson's, rheumatoid arthritis, and schizophrenia. Open-heart surgery and organ transplants saved millions of lives, and test-tube babies created new hope for infertile couples. Yet the seemingly ineluctable forward march of modern medicine has slowed nearly to a halt. In The rise and fall of modern medicine, historian of science and medicine James Le Fanu explains why. His work illustrates the power of the scientific method in pushing the boundaries of medical knowledge, but also shows how human vanities -- and the inscrutable mysteries of biology -- have impeded recent progress. Now in a revised edition with a new epilogue addressing the recent rise in health care costs, the implications of the Human Genome Project, and the growth of Big Pharma, this provacative book celebrates the extraordinary progress medical research has achieved in the latter half of the twentieth century, and confronts the challenges it faces in the twenty-first