Chapter Thirty-Seven
Real Universal Health
“It is not just new viruses that have
doctors worried. Perhaps the most ominous
prospect of all is a virulent strain of
influenza. Every so often, a highly lethal
strain emerges. Unlike HIV, flu moves
through the air and is highly contagious.
The last killer strain showed up in 1918 and
claimed 20 million lives — more than all the
combat deaths in World War I. And that was
before global air travel; the next outbreak
could be even more devastating.”
—Time Magazine
By now during my Neothink Visions, the
images centered more and more around our
health. More than anything else in the
twenty-first century, the people cried out
for the geniuses, with their groundbreaking
technologies, to eradicate virulent
diseases.
Devastating new diseases were on the rise
and, perhaps even worse, drug-resistant
strains of several old killer diseases were
back. Those frightening new diseases and new
strains tended to break down our acceptance
of the FDA that suppressed the rise of
Neothink geniuses in the medical industry
and held back the rapid advancement of the
medical industry. Our physical survival more
and more depended on rapid advancement.
My Twelfth Vision showed me that during the
early twenty-first century, doctors were
less and less able to handle certain
infectious diseases that were gaining
resistance to antibiotics. A powerful
warning came when only a single remaining
antibiotic could stop a popular strain of
staph infection that commonly spread
throughout hospitals. Once that lone
remaining antibiotic ceased to work,
hospitals would become risky places to
visit. Then, the common strep infection
gained resistance to antibiotics. My Twelfth
Vision warned me of the increasing danger as
we advanced into the new millennium. A
killer disease, tuberculosis, returned, this
time attacking our children, and this time
even a combination of antibiotics could not
stop it.
In short, infectious diseases caught up with
and began to surpass modern medicine in the
twenty-first century. The FDA worked against
a major medical revolution that was just
waiting to explode with greater force than
the computer revolution. In fact, the
inherent force of a medical/biotech
explosion was so great that even with the
FDA, genetic engineering such as the Human
Genome Project and other biomedical projects
were advancing at an all-time pace. But the
mighty biomedical explosion could not ignite
with the FDA smothering progress. As with
computers, the technology needed quick
access to the marketplace, which the FDA
blocked. Indeed, the marketplace is the
oxygen needed to ignite the biomedical
explosion, which the FDA smothered.
Here is a brief review of a Time Magazine
warning.
Killers All Around:
New
Viruses and Drug-Resistant Bacteria Are
Reversing Human Victories Over Infectious
Disease
(A Review of Time Magazine Cover
Story)
The Time Magazine cover story begins
by reminding us how, not long ago, humanity
thought that infectious diseases were
rapidly becoming a thing of the past. In the
1970s, the medical world started boasting
its imminent victory. And why not?
Previously deadly illnesses such as polio,
small pox, malaria, diphtheria, pertussis,
tetanus “seemed like quaint reminders of a
bygone era, like Model T Fords or silent
movies”. And antibiotics transformed the
most terrifying diseases known to mankind
such as tuberculosis, syphilis, pneumonia,
bacterial meningitis, and even bubonic
plague into “mere inconveniences that if
caught could be cured with pills or shots”.
Medical students were being told not to go
into infectious disease, a “declining
speciality”. Instead, they were advised to
concentrate on “real problems” such as
cancer and heart disease.
But, unfortunately, today the era of great
medical success and confidence has been
giving way to a new era of unnerving medical
defeats…and fear. The Time cover
story states, “The question ceased to be,
When will infectious disease be wiped out?
and became, Where will the next deadly new
plague break out?” The article goes on to
tell us about new lethal agents emerging in
Africa and South America. As population
grows and man settles new parts of the
world, such as a new part of the Brazilian
rain forest, for example, new deadly
diseases spread from other animals such as
monkeys to humans. As those deadly agents
adapt to humans, they gain the potential for
large-scale deadly pandemics. In a world of
extensive air travel, those deadly agents
become just a plane ride from America.
And it could get worse, the Time
article claims. Antibiotics are our main
defense that stand between us and some of
the most deadly bacterial diseases. But
bacteria have been evolving and steadily
adapting for survival, and now they are well
adapting to antibiotics. In fact, the
article warns us that every disease known to
man is already resistant to antibiotics of
one form or another. Several devastating
diseases once thought to be nearly
eradicated are back and on the rise:
malaria, cholera, measles, tuberculosis,
even bubonic plague. Perhaps even more
threatening are the “seemingly prosaic but
once deadly infections” staph and strep.
They have become much harder to treat. Both
spread through the cleanest of hospitals,
routinely cured with antibiotics. But as
those two infections develop universal
resistance, the article questions, what will
happen to our hospitals?
“One of medicine’s worst nightmares is the
development of a drug-resistant strain of
severe invasive strep A,” the article
states. Severe, invasive strep A killed
Muppeteer Jim Henson in 1990; this vicious
killer is on the rise.
Bacteria adapt to antibiotics because, while
rapidly multiplying, bacteria mutate and
change slightly, just enough to outwit their
combatant drugs.
Viruses, on the other hand, are usually
tamed and sometimes even eradicated by the
preventive vaccine. But the article points
out that new viruses keep emerging. Viruses
that have gone undetected, inhabiting animal
populations, can and sometimes do make the
jump to humans. The Time article
tells us that was the case with some very
lethal African viruses such as Ebola, which
made the jump from monkeys to humans.
Still, the biggest fear of all, as explained
in that Time Magazine article, would
be another killer flu, which usually makes
the jump from another animal to humans.
Humans have little defense against such a
flu, and if it took hold, then it would
wreak deadly havoc. The 1997-1998 Hong Kong
“chicken flu” introduced such a killer flu
that, tragically, killed a few people in
Hong Kong but, fortunately, did not take
hold and go into a widespread outbreak. Now,
each year that avian flu attempts to jump to
and spread among humans. When a global
outbreak does happen, the world will never
be the same.
The Time Magazine article was a
warning. Today’s biomedical progress is
impressive, but is it moving fast enough?
The answer is: no, not until the technology
has quick access to the marketplace, as do
the computers. And that means no regulatory
FDA.
The definitive antidote is “begging” to
happen now, in the early twenty-first
century, to rescue the human race from the
threatening plagues. That antidote to the
threatening human catastrophes is: super
rapidly evolving technologies. Only
rapidly evolving new technologies can win
the race against rapidly evolving infectious
diseases. But those new technologies will
not evolve quickly enough until they can
swiftly reach the marketplace.
Killer Flu: Seattle police wore protective
masks during the pandemic of 1918. That
killer flu infected 1 billion people and
killed more than 20 million in 10 months.
The population in 1918 was less than half of
today.
Starting in the late twentieth century,
continuing into the twenty-first century,
the national media such as Time Magazine
repeatedly warned us we were suddenly
losing the race against infectious diseases,
with mutant strains of old diseases
returning after decades of “absence” and new
diseases invading us with devastating
results. The media warned that a medical
defeat to microbes could bring with it human
catastrophes such as those experienced in
the time of bubonic plague, polio, and
killer flus. The Superflu of 1918 infected
over one billion people, half the
world’s population in 1918, and killed over
20 million people in just 10 months. Never
in the history of the world had there been
so many deaths in such a short period of
time. Man has not experienced anything close
to that catastrophic pandemic since, but in
the early twenty-first century, scientists
fear a repeat is not far away.
The 1918 Spanish Flu, as it was often
called, actually started right here in the
United States and infected 25% of our
population. Doctors have warned in the early
twenty-first century that logistically “we
are due” for another killer strain. In fact,
in 1976, we survived a great scare — a false
alarm, or perhaps more apropos, a fair
warning: A soldier at Fort Dix, New Jersey
got the flu and died. The medical world was
stunned when the virus taken from the dead
soldier was a descendent of the 1918 killer
flu. The medical world braced itself for
another catastrophe of unthinkable
proportions. But the deadly virus that made
the jump from birds to humans was an
isolated case unable, this time, of passing
among humans. This time, we were lucky. Next
time…
Only super rapidly advancing new technology
can prevent a “next time”. The race is on.
Every year a handful of people die from
avian flu. It is only a matter of time
before it will pass freely from human to
human. The new technology of genetic
engineering has the potential to permanently
and universally stop deadly viruses and
bacteria. The problem with this promising
new technology in the early twenty-first
century, however, is that it is not super
rapidly advancing, not fast enough…not
until the removal of the FDA. Remember,
super rapidly advancing new technology
demands rapid access to the marketplace.
Breakthrough technologies and drugs must
freely reach the marketplace. Private
regulatory services with risk-rating systems
would be in place, but simply put, the way
things are now with the FDA, we will lose
the race. For a computerlike medical
revolution to happen, the FDA will have to
come to an end in order to spring loose the
geniuses of society and their new
technologies.
The following brief review from the same
issue of Time Magazine reveals new
technologies pursued by doctors, scientists,
and businessmen (but again, missing the key
ingredient of market-accessible
super rapidly advancing new technologies):
Counterattack: How Drugmakers Are Fighting
Back
(A Review of Time Magazine Article)
“Doctors and the public were not alone in
feeling cocky about infectious disease a
decade ago. The drug companies did too,” so
began the article. “More than 100
antibiotics were on the market, and they had
most bacterial diseases on the run, if not
on the verge of eradication.”
The pharmaceutical industry simply modified
existing antibiotics to stay one step ahead
of the bacteria. But that approach no longer
works. So, researchers are turning to new
technologies to get back in the lead against
disease.
One dynamic approach is called “rational”
drug design. Scientists study the molecular
structure of a bacterium, particularly the
active site of the enzyme used by the
bacterium to fight off the antibiotic. Next,
scientists attempt to design a molecule to
“plug up” the active site of that enzyme.
Without the effect of that enzyme, the
bacterium would once again be killed by the
original drug.
A similar concept is being pursued against
viruses. You see, viruses cause their damage
by invading our bodies’ living cells. To
invade a living cell involves receptor
sites, like little hooks, where the virus
joins the cell. Similarly, a molecule can be
designed to block the receptor sites so the
virus never attaches to our cells thus
remains harmless to our bodies. …So goes the
search for such defendant molecules through
combinatorial chemistry.
Again, the problem with such new medical
technologies is that they are not super
rapidly advancing …not as they should
be, not like, say, computer technology. How,
then, did our country finally get medical
technology to super rapidly advance
to prevent the coming human catastrophes? My
Twelfth Vision showed me:
The Great Rescue
I witnessed during the Twelfth Vision that
the looming medical catastrophes helped us
see reality and depoliticize the medical
industry. Two things happened at once by
depoliticizing medicine: 1) record amounts
of private research funds went toward
medical research, and 2) a record number of
entrepreneurial geniuses went into medical
research. Those unhindered geniuses of
society drove medical technology into
unimaginable new dimensions that eradicated
the most complex diseases. In short, the
Neothink geniuses drove forth those new
technologies to save our lives.
Depoliticizing the medical industry,
depoliticizing everything about it from
regulations on health insurance to
regulations on medical research, saved many
tens of millions of lives.
Today, each added increment of politicizing
the medical industry further bureaucratizes
and slows advancing new medical technology,
which in turn dramatically drives away
private research funds. Medical projects
become too inefficient and cost-prohibitive
for businesses to invest. Moreover, the lone
entrepreneurs, those aggressive geniuses of
society, could never function in such a
cost-prohibitive, risky environment. The
force of their creativity and endless energy
that so propelled the free computer/Internet
industry is but a fraction of what it could
be in the medical industry. They are needed
to unlock the cures to the most complex
diseases.
In the Twelfth Vision, those geniuses, once
they were free to flourish and leap into
Neothink, rapidly unlocked otherwise
impossible combinations.
Politicization ravages our health and costs
us millions of precious lives. Each
incremental step the other way —
depoliticizing the medical industry —
dramatically frees up thus speeds up
advancing technology, which in turn
dramatically attracts private research funds
and opens up the medical industry to the
entrepreneurs and their endless energy and
creativity, their speed and ability to
ferret out brilliant advances.
In the Twelfth Vision, I witnessed that we
outgrew our desire to be ruled over. As
people began dying in increasing numbers, at
a faster rate than the bio-tech advancements
started saving people, we chose to
depoliticized the medical industry to make
it as free as the computer industry.
Survival pressures changed our toleration
levels for debilitating big government.
Without it, the geniuses did to medicine
what they did to computers. Our country won
this race against the microbes. In the
Twelve-Visions World, after depoliticizing
the medical industry, more and more geniuses
rose up and saved us from worldwide human
catastrophes. That medical revolution became
known as the Great Rescue. But the human
losses were never forgotten.
Two Forces That Brought Us the
Twelve-Visions World
My Twelfth Vision showed me two forces at
work: Rising within us, we felt
disillusioned with politicians and
regulatory bureaucracies. A steady rebellion
against a ruling class started spontaneously
rising throughout civilizations around the
world, from China and the Orient, through
Russia and Eastern Europe, Asia Minor and
down through Africa, to the relatively free
United States and throughout Central and
South America. Those early signs of the new
Neothink mentality, spontaneously rising
throughout different civilizations around
the globe, affected us at home.
Tomorrow, we started resisting the ruling
class and its politicization over our lives
just as we would resist a religious cult
trying to tell us how to live. A shrinking
number of people tolerated big government
legislating and regulating our money,
morals, and businesses.
That anti-authority trend gained momentum as
medical catastrophes loomed. Under growing
survival pressures, the people saw more
clearly and ended the ruling class.
There was also another, more specific force
at work: the inevitable
The
1. Near-perfect health for the young, the
old, and for those in their prime.
2. Millionaire-like wealth for ordinary
people, including the poor.
3. Exciting creative jobs for nearly
everyone, which released nearly
everyone’s human potential (the Fifth and
Sixth Visions).
Young Again
My Twelfth Vision showed me that as the
ordinary person got swept into a stimulating
life of nearly perfect health and
millionaire wealth, he passionately sought
life over death. Death at mid-70 simply
became unacceptable. Science, medicine,
business, and entrepreneurs focused on an
epic event: eradicate diseases and illnesses
to enable ordinary people to live healthily
well into their hundreds, and then beyond.
Technology-blocking “higher authorities”
such as the FDA that burdened progress were
scorned out of existence by the people.
Today, most people feel the unacceptability
of the ultimate disease, aging. But
few people can relate to their own greatest
tragedy of dying in their 70s because:
• The thought of living healthily and
prosperously for 130 years or more seems
like science fiction.
• One’s wealth, health, love and happiness
are stagnant or shrinking. At 75 years, life
is no longer very stimulating, and the
desire to live longer in “old age” is gone.
In tomorrow’s rapidly progressing
Twelve-Visions World, I saw (in my Twelfth
Neothink Vision) that the idea of living
longer did not seem so futuristic. What
before seemed technologically impossible was
in wide use. Without disease, we lived well
into our hundreds. Moreover, the idea of
extending human life by slowing the disease
of cellular degeneration or aging, and
slowing the effects of gravity and entropy,
became a mass appeal, especially as ordinary
people became wealthy, healthy, and in love
with life…the young and romantic life. The
geniuses were hard at work learning how to
extend our lives!
Today, by contrast, people eventually lose
the desire to live. Sinking in stagnation,
most good people experience limited
financial and emotional success. Physically,
emotionally, and financially burned out,
most older people do not care to live too
much longer. Quality of elderly life is far
below what it would be in tomorrow’s
Twelve-Visions World. Thus, today the desire
to live longer is not in wide demand.
In tomorrow’s nonpoliticized
wealthy/healthy/exhilarating Twelve-Visions
World, I saw people regain a childlike
desire to live longer. Rich and in love with
life, the desire to live longer was in wide
demand.
Death Under 100 Became Unacceptable
A strong sense of tragedy grew in us as we
got older and closed in on death. We
emotionally grasped the unacceptability of
dying in our 70s. In fact, the thought of
dying at all, not to mention so young,
grew increasingly intolerable. That
unacceptability of dying was a direct result
of our deep and permanent happiness as value
creators (Vision Two). Tomorrow, the freed
geniuses of society raced forward to answer
our cries for life as we discovered the
persons we were meant to be, forever ending
the burden of life (Visions One and Two).
Most of us today do not grasp the tragedy of
dying so young because, as we grow older, we
steadily lose our enthusiasm for life. The
burden of life comes to the surface as we
use up our happy experiences of life (Vision
Two). We cannot blame ourselves, for in
today’s suppressed world, life offers
limited mortal doses of wealth and
happiness.
My Twelfth Vision showed me that tomorrow’s
Twelve-Visions World actually reversed
the trend: enthusiasm actually
intensified as we grew older. As
Neothink value creators, we built larger and
larger puzzles of creation, which became
very exhilarating. Instead of withering in
our ruts, we blossomed in our creations.
In tomorrow’s Twelve-Visions World, our
brief seven-and-a-half decades of life was
considered much too brief for the wealthy
and happy ordinary person. The demand for
living longer grew enormous. First, disease
was eradicated to give us healthy life well
into our hundreds. Then, major businesses,
financial institutions, scientists, research
doctors and entrepreneurs embraced the
growing demand for longer life. Money,
minds, technology, science, medicine came
together through entrepreneurial business.
Their superpuzzle soon pieced together the
ultimate demand of slowing down and
eventually curing the disease of aging. (See
my Neothink trilogy Superpuzzle, 1200
pages).
The geniuses awakened the sleeping-giant
consumer product of all time: life
extension. For suddenly, happy people’s
brief time in all eternity became
unacceptable. Too brief. Within your
lifetime, the new Twelve-Visions World
doubled your journey through life…and
eventually more.
The Life We Were Meant To Live
Tomorrow’s Twelve-Visions World saved us
from emotional diminishment and lifted us to
the next level of happiness. We lived each
and every day with four new frontiers of
happiness, described in Twelve Visions
(a Mark Hamilton Publication).
Today’s world brings us uneventful years for
the time we have left…for our one short
experience of life in all eternity. In the
Twelve-Visions World, by contrast, my
Twelfth Vision showed me we were like
children with so much yet to experience. As
value creators, we had no limits…always
another adventure to create and experience.
We finally lived the lives human beings were
meant to live. Before the Twelve Neothink
Visions, we had no clue of that life.
Tomorrow, life was bigger than life again,
like when we were children. Every new day
filled us with exhilaration. Creating
exciting new values was how we played as
adults. Yes, play …like children. We
enjoyed the love from our fellow man for
creating important values for society. The
burden of life was gone. We achieved both
the technology and the desire to live a lot,
lot longer (Vision Four). We enjoyed nearly
perfect physical and mental health for a
long, extended life of happiness.
Today, the regulatory and entitlement
programs for the “social good” are illusions
that politicize our lives and rule over us —
over our money, morals, and businesses. The
career politicians and regulatory
bureaucrats get enormous power, prestige,
and they control enormous wealth. On the
other hand, we get suppressed and stuck with
physical diseases, mental stagnation, and
short burdensome lives.
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