The Future of Medicine in the Age of Biotech

Everything you wanted to know about the future of health care industry and related themes. Keynote speech plus videos below by Dr Patrick Dixon (physician and futurist) for gene technology companies and biotech analysts / investors in Zurich. Audience of 150 - October 2002

How scientists will attempt to slow down or stop the ageing process - video
Comment by Dr Patrick Dixon on science of ageing, health care, life expectancy, medical advances, pensions, retirement, lifestyles and government policy.

Themes: The future of medicine and health care. Major trends impacting every area of health care. How genetics will create new patterns of drug discovery and drug development. New cures and treatments. Ethical and social issues of biotech. Gene testing for insurance, genetic predictions of disease and related issues. Human cloning and reproductive technologies. How public mood towards biotech is changing. Media pressures and single issue activism. Laws, regulations and moral debates.

Human Cloning - How Clones Will Be Made, Stem Cells & Future Researchc:


Dr Patrick Dixon lecture to biotech venture capital investors about future medicine and health care, gene therapy, biotechnology, and the pharmaceutical industry. Dr Dixon is a physician and trends analyst.

Tissue of dead humans to be cloned!

Friends, we are now 'looking' at what's to come! What is the future of human beings
gonna be like? Let us all ponder on this report and figure out the future of our children .....


From The Sunday Times
June 1, 2008

Tissue of dead humans to be cloned

Marie Woolf, Whitehall Editor

Scientists are to be permitted to use tissue from dead people to create cloned human stem cells for research, under a legal change put forward by the government.

Health ministers have proposed that laboratories should be allowed to use stored human tissue to create cloned embryonic stem cells without the explicit consent of the tissue donor. This would allow research to be done on tissue donated for medical research as long as 30 years ago. Scientists would also be able to use cells from people who have died since they donated their tissue or who cannot be contacted.

Many laboratories have banks of stored tissue which act as DNA libraries that can play a vital role in finding cures for serious disorders such as diabetes and motor neurone disease.

Ministers have until now insisted that scientists contact tissue donors to gain explicit consent before DNA can be used to create cloned embryonic stem cells.

Leading scientists, including three Nobel prize winners, say gaining such consent is sometimes impossible because the donors have died, donated anonymously or cannot be contacted. They say the ban on using DNA without consent could hold up vital research.

Ministers have tabled an amendment to the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill, now passing through parliament, which would allow stored tissue and cells to be used without the explicit consent of donors. The amendment, which is expected to be supported by most MPs, will be debated this week.