Terrible Gift

by Rick J. Carlson and Gary Stimeling

A provocative, cautionary exploration of the onrushing revolution in health care: its science-fiction benefits, its hidden dangers, and the disturbing choices it will force us all to make. The mapping... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1891620657
• ISBN13: 9781891620652
• Release Date: May 2002
• Publisher: PublicAffairs
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 1.35 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.1" x 6.4" x 9.6"

Customer Reviews

Excellent Gift

If you don't subscribe to the "money equals truth" philosophy of modern medicine, if you don't trust corporations with the genetic future of the earth, you owe it to yourself to read this book. The authors cover a lot of ground, and sometimes I wished for more detail, but they succeed in bringing clarity to their hopelessly confused subject. The book is well documented without drowning the reader in statistics. Best of all, it's written with style, instead of the dry prose you might expect from a book on health care policy. Highly recommended.

An eye-opening look at the future of medicine

This book took me a long time to read, because I savored it one chapter at a time. I kept having to put it down and think about something. But I'm amazed at how the authors managed to get such a seemingly effortless grasp on such a welter of daunting and complicated material. I mean, there's all this arcane stuff about health-care policy and drug design, and yet it somehow comes together in a big picture that makes sense, even to me. It feels like you have a couple of friends leading you through the perilous shark-infested shoals of this brave new world. Some of it's pretty scary, too, like new bacteria for terrorists starting at $5,000, and maybe secret genetic warfare or population control--possibly even going on right now--and future vaccines spliced into food that could control your mind without your even knowing it. All in all, I'd say it's a great look at the promise of the future combined with the dangers of letting our current system handle everything. It makes you wonder whether the new medicine is going to be worth the price.

Explores all aspects of medicine's new challenges

Rick Carlson and Gary Stimeling's Terrible Gift provides an eye-opening inspection of genetic medicine's ethical and moral implications. The physician's role has changed from a curer to an enhancer: this explores all aspects of medicine's new challenges.

A seminal work.

This is an exceptional book. Everyone involved with health and health care -- whether as planner, executive, provider, or consumer -- needs to read this mind-boggling book. The Terrible Gift: The Brave New World of Genetic Medicine provides a compelling, and sometimes disturbing, portrait of both the considerable benefits and potential calamities inherent in the manipulation of nature in search of tomorrow's future medicine. I have read several of Carlson's books in the past - such as The End of Medicine, and he always seems to have one foot in the future. His ideas are well thought-out, insightful and often, visionary.