Can science really provide the answer to everything? This question has become a debate topic for decades especially between science and technology supporters against religions. In the days of Newton, an educated person can grasped an outline of all human knowledge by using science knowledge. By ‘science’, of course, is meant primarily on physics , which is fundamentals to all studies including chemistry, biology, astronomy, and also all macro and micro investigations. Physics has identified the laws which keep the universe in a state of equilibrium, and today sees a unified theory to account for the space-time continuum necessary to the existence of that equilibrium, and also the other dimensions beyond the four known which are postulated. of our lives including health sector.
Science then filled some of the gaps left by the deliberations of the philosophers and theologians, and has far outstripped the contributions of both since then. Philosophy has degenerated into historical study, and has no modern contribution to make. Theology has no advance since Middle Ages. Thus, the mantle of seeking answers to man’s most fundamental questions such as life, death, and mankind’s existence has fallen on science. of our lives including health sector.
Science and its manifestation, technology, has experienced rapid advancement since then and nowadays has affected every aspect of our lives ranging from communication, transportation, education, entertainment, health, and many more. New technologies are released into public every months or even weeks. These inventions offered us more comfortable life and easiness in every part of our lives including health sector.
Genetic research has made rapid strides over the past few years. The analysis of genes has had a practical effect on human medicine as well as on animals and plants lives. Tendencies to physical and mental handicap can be detected at the pre-embryo stage, during the first fourteen days after conception. Genetic manipulation and very early abortion to prevent the birth of child with physical or mental disability are possible. Artificially created organs can be produced by using stem cells taken from predeveloped embryo, allowing easier access of organ reserves for transplantation in case of accidents or sudden organ malfunction. Science and technology advancement has allowed us to find cures for incurable diseases in the past such as tuberculosis, cancers, and even as far as creating a life prolonging medicine which is said to be able to prolong someone life as long as it is consumed by affecting body tissues and cells metabolisms.
However, the advancement of health science and technologies invite questions in oppose to moral values and religion views. This has been led into a major controversion between the pros and cons or supporters and opposers oh health advanced technology usage.
So, what are the points of controversies in this matter? First, the pros argued that health science and technology advancement has provided us with easier access for health facilities and medical treatments. Mass productions of medical equipments and medicines in industrial ages nowadays allowed for cheaper medical treatments as the facilities and equipments are abundant in quantities. In the past, health treatments were expensive because the supplies of medicines, equipments, and doctors were still scarce. Because of that, only a few people in society have the access for medical treatments. Most of the hailed from middle to upper class in society. People from lower classes such as beggars and poor citizens were not able to receive any medical treatments because they didn’t have enough money to afford it. However, the situation is different now. Technology advancement in health sector allowed for sufficient reserves of medical facilities, equipments, and medicine. Because of that, the cost of medical treatments can be lowered and all citizens become able to afford it, including poor citizens. Abundant reserves of health facilities also means sufficient distribution in every regions, so we will not have to travel far in order to get medical treatment as it is available around our living places.
On the contrary, the cons argued that easy access to health facilities and medical treatment has make people less considering their own health. Back to the old days, when health facilities and treatments were still scarce and expensive, people were afraid to get sick because the cost to cure sickness was expensive. Because of that, they carefully took care of their health by consuming hygiene and nutritional foods, exercise regularly, and keeping their living environment clean in order to prevent spreading of diseases. Nowadays, people become apathy toward their own health because they think that even if they get sick, it is cheap and easy to cure it by getting medical treatment or consuming medicines. They consume junk foods or snacks frequently which are bad for health because the foods contain additive or artificial chemical elements, never or seldom exercise, and do not take care of their living environment which cause the spreading of diseases. As the health and medical technology advance further which make curing sickness become easier and faster, people will become even less care about their health.
Second, the advancement of health science and technology has allowed the foundation of cures for previously incurable diseases such as cancer and tuberculosis. Incurable diseases had claim many lives in the past without any effective cure to counter it. Because of that, scientists had worked very hard to research cures for those diseases, so many people lives could be saved. By saving a life, does not mean we just save that one person. Infinite branch philosophy tells us that from a person, an infinite possibility of offsprings or descendants will be born, creating an infinite branch. That is why, saving one person’s life also means saving the lives of his or her future descendants. Taking that into account, we can say that the inventions of those cures have saved countless lives. This is the main reason and focus of health science and technology advancement for decades as health technologies were created to save lives by curing every possible disease, so that people will not have to die because of them. As more diseases can be cured, more people lives can be saved.
On the other side, the cons argued that the inventions and usage of new cures for diseases are the primary cause of the appearance of new diseases. Medicine works through biological process by eliminating pathogenic organism’s cell membrane, causing it to die and dissipate. Another way is by altering the shape of specific cell which is used as the pathogenic organism’s base of infection. The infection process can only occur if the base cell and pathogen cell are combining like a lock and its key. Altering the shape of the lock will cause the key to not be able to fit in to the lock and preventing the infection process from occurring. However, every organism has the ability to adapt in order to keep living and continue their lineage. Large frequency of medicine usage has caused pathogenic organisms such as virus and bacteria to mutate. Their genetic code and physiology evolved to make them immune to the medicine’s effect. The more effective and advanced the medicine used, viruses and bacterias will be evolved into even more ferocious types, causing even more severe diseases. For example, the frequent usage of antibiotics for tuberculosis disease has caused Mycobacterium tuberculosis, the bacteria responsible for this disease, to mutate into several stronger types. Because of this, tuberculosis disease has developed into several types which are more severe than the previous one. Another example is the infamous ebola virus. Originally isolated from monkey species, this virus has caused the appearance of the most frightening disease in the world. Any person who is subjected to this virus will show the symptoms in only about a couple of minutes. First, the victim’s body will feel extremely hot and hurt. Then, blood will come out through all of pores on his or her skin such as nose, eyes, ears, and skin pores. The victim will die shortly after that because of blood loss and all his or her organs will not be found because they are already melted by the virus.
Next, health science and technology has increased the quality of human life and prolonging human living rate as it developed. Health is one of the indicators for determining people’s life quality beside wealth, accomodation, education, and daily consumption. Poor health caused people to easily suffer from illness. While ill, he or she will not be able to work and decresing the income for his or her family life. Because of that, they might suffer from financial problems and become unable to afford for enough foods, accomodations, or education. We can see that poor health could affected overall quality of human life as it will caused problem in another aspects of life too. Health technology advancement has provided a solution for this matter as health facilities and treatments become easier and cheaper to be accessed by all people in society. Thus, overall quality of human life is increased. Living rate is also increased as advanced health technology offered us many kinds of medicines and treatments to cure our diseases. Even for genetic disease such as thalasemia or sickle cell anemia which are inherited diseases caused by disorganized structure of base sequences in victim’s DNA or gene, health advanced technology offered a way to cure this through genetic manipulation method. Human Genome Project, which is done to map all possible gene structures of all humans from around the world has helped for more precise genetic manipulation as precise dislocation of gene sequence can be detected. Advanced health science enables the usage of stem cells taken from predeveloped embryo to be developed into every kinds of organs or tissues in human body. This technology allows scientists to create artificial organs like lungs and hearts for organ transplantation. Because of that, victims of damaged organs or tissues caused by accidents or other reasons will not have to wait for available organs to come from donors as organ reserves for transplantations are plenty. It will ensure that the victim’s life can be saved without relying his or her life and death to the availability of organ reserves.
However, the cons argued that the usage of stem cells derived from embryo for organ transplantation or hybridome method to produce cancer cure is the same as murdering the life potential within the embryo. According to Pope John Paul the Second statement, a life form has been created by God and existed even in its tiniest form, the pre-embryonal stage of life. Every life exist according to God’s will including the birth of embryos which contain human life potentials. That’s why, using that potential and causing it to disappear. Even though it is used for medical purpose is just the same as legalized murder act. Many people think that life is only started after a baby born from his or her mother’s womb. That’s the reason why they think it is okay to use embryo as it hasn’t got any life in it yet. But actually, the reverse is true. This viewpoints invoke numerous protests and opposing acts against the utilization of the controversial stem cells usage in medical technology.
Lastly, the pros argued that with the advancement in health science and technology, health sector has been moving toward its primary goal which is to cure all possible diseases that appeared especially on mankind around the world whether they are vector based disease like viral and bacterial diseases or disease caused by abnormality in gene structure. Thus, more people will have longer and healthier life. With advanced health technology, more effective health treatments can be done, better health facilities with sufficient amounts can be built, also better medical equipments and medicines can be produced. That way, people’s healthy life and biological problems can be solved. Recent technology allows the production of prosthetic arms and legs which serve as subtitutes for the real ones for people who was born wihout them or losing them as a result of accidents or diseases. To further improve people’s health and lives, medical scientists even go as far as researching a medicine which can greatly prolonging people’s life. It is said that consuming this medicine will boost your life span for years as long as you consumed it. This is an effort done by medical researchers in their way to bring health sector into its peak.
Again, this argument is strongly opposed by the cons, stating that prolonging life is an act against God’s will. Life and death come from God and only God has the right to determines it because our lives derived from Him. Prolonging a life that should have ended means that we, human, are trying to play god. This is also the reason why many people oppose human cloning technology and research to create supreme or perfect human being using genetic manipulation as it is clearly violate God’s territory. Besides, if health has advanced so far, that all diseases in the world can be cured and human lives can be prolonged greatly, this will cause a major problem. Every year, human birth rate keeps increasing. To counter this, it is balanced by the mortality rate. If people’s health qualities are so high that has make them possess longer lives nut the birth rate is still on going, mankind’s population around the world will rise rapidly, causing overpopulation. By overpopulation means that there will not be enough places for all humans to dwell on Earth, causing great famine because of food supplies limited resources and also crisis of energies . Earth’s ecosystem balance will be disrupted and eventually causing mankind to extinct themselves because as the law of unintended consequences stated that it is impossible to change one aspect of a complex system without affecting other parts of the system, often in unpredictable ways. If that happens, we can say that mankind’s overly efforts to improve their own health have brought them to their own demises.
So, in conclusion, we can see that the advancement of health science and technology has indeed saved countless lives and improved mankind’s life qualities greatly. But we must also remember that as human, our capabilities are limited. We shouldn’t try to breach God’s territory such as life and death by creating supreme race of human beings and other actions which clearly violated God’s will. God’s plan is always aimed for the goodness of us, humans. That is why, while utilizing advanced technology and science, we shouldn’t forget about religious and moral values. For instance, we should try to research other methods for organ creation and abnormal embryo genetic manipulation to prevent the loss of life potentials in embryos for health cause. That way, we will not become arrogant, which will bring us to our own extinction in the end.
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