X-Message-Number: 5081 Date: 31 Oct 95 14::05 EST From: Saul Kent <> Subject: Technological Progress Keith Lynch wrote that: "Another major risk is that general technological progress will be slowed by government red tape..." This is far more than a "risk", it is a reality...a very sad reality! Perhaps the most damaging type of "red tape" that the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) uses to slow progress in the United States is applied so unconsiously and so insidiously that it might better be termed "transparent tape". The idea of anti-aging research is beyond the pale of the conceptual framework the FDA operates under. The FDA has no protocol to approve anti-aging drugs (or therapies), no idea whatever what such a protocol should entail, and no apparent interest in developing such a protocol. In fact, the last time I checked, the FDA had yet to agree on a protocol to approve drugs to treat Alzheimer's Disease, even though they've already approved a couple of drugs for that purpose and have about 16 others in their regulatory pipeline. The result is that little anti-aging research is being conducted by pharmaceutical companies and what research is being done (by companies such as Geron) is being done ostensibly to treat specific diseases, not aging. Another related problem is that, because the prevailing model for biomedical research is to test one therapeutic agent at a time, and because the FDA almost never deviates from orthodoxy, the agency discourages the development of multi-modal therapies which have been shown to be superior to single therapies in many areas including cancer chemotherapy and preventive medicine. Many years ago, Jerry White (now in cryopreservation) told me he was against all government-sponsored scientific research. At the time, I disagreed with Jerry on the pragmatic grounds that, since the government takes so much of our money, it's better that they spend it on biomedical research than on other more wasteful pursuits. My second argument in favor of government-sponsored biomedical research was that a good deal of useful research has been conducted with government money. My third argument was that I thought the government is more likely (than private companies) to fund the kind of basic, fundamental research that is necessary in many cases to develop new therapies. I now agree with Jerry. I now believe it would best if government were to get out of the research business *and* the regulation of medicine entirely. I now believe that the good that comes out of government control of research and medicine is greatly outweighed by the damage that it does. One of the negative consequences of government-sponsored research is the kind of paralyzing fear and dependency it instills in scientists, and the loss of creativity that results from their lack of independence. I now believe that the requisite basic research would be adquately funded privately if there was no government-sponsored research. I now believe that, if the government would leave enterprising immortalists such as me (and my partner Bill Faloon) alone, we would personally fund the research needed to achieve physical immortality in the foreseeable future. ---Saul Kent Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=5081