Tuesday, January 22, 2013

That's insane

Invention Would Track Meds in Mentally Ill Patients, But Is It Ethical?
Imagine if doctors could add something to their mentally ill patients’ pills so that they could tell on their smartphones whether the patients were taking the pills as prescribed.
Inventor Don Spector has actually filed a patent that would do just that, and he did it after the Sandy Hook school shootings in Connecticut, which sparked a national debate about mental illness and privacy.
“This isn’t house arrest, but it is an invasion of privacy to some extent,”  Spector, Chairman of the Board of Trustees at New York College of Health Professions, said of his invention. “But on the other hand, these are really people who shouldn’t be released without medication.”
That's closing the loop.  The drug and insurance companies would have the entire vertical market locked up.  Guaranteed supply of mentally incapacitated patients.

Now let's imagine that a whole bunch of crazy people actually get better using items they find at the grocery store and it becomes obvious those doctors and drugs weren't really helping them at all...