Here's that futuristic age you've been asking for...
Thomas Keister
July 18, 2006
I've said it once, I've said it a hundred times. So far, the future has been a rip-off. The brave new world they were touting in the 80s is just as far away as it was when the hype was written differently in the 60s. Seriously, about all they have done is create the internet and make the cell phone, and then make it smaller by the minute. Fielding emails regarding male enhancement while trying to find the cell phone I lost under a pepper shaker does not exactly make me feel as though I'm living in Blade Runner, or the like.
Over the last twenty-five years, and especially in the last five, the only similarity I have found with the science fiction I grew up reading and watching is not the kind everybody was lining up for. Ignoring the partisan bickering that translates into nothing being done, the Earth is slowly being rendered into an original episode Star Trek backdrop. Sure, lifespans are increasing, but what reward awaits all that progress? You have your cake, yes, but what are you going to eat it off of?
Where we had visions of hovercars and 3D holographic TVs, what we have are more surveillance gear and a hell of a lot less checks and balances. While it is easy to dismiss this as more liberal crackpot panic button-mashing, at the same token, it is just as easy to ask where the line is, and how long ago was it that we passed it by?
Most of us have probably by now read stories about research being done with ultra-small or easily invisible microchips. First, it was retailers, experimenting with chips woven into fabric, for purposes of inventory tracking and loss prevention. Then, the talk switched to tagging military personnel, for troop movement analysis and location tracking. Admit it, there was just the slightest of chills the first time you read the words "microchip," "tracking," and "human" in the same sentence. In a newspaper. A real newspaper.
This leads us to, of all places, Hackensack, New Jersey. Not exactly the location I had in mind for something like this breaking out. In a test program being conducted be Horizon Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Jersey and Hackensack University Medical Center, 280 patients will be implanted with microchips that would allow ER staff to bring up a patient's medical record if they were unable to communicate. The chip, roughly the size of a grain of rice, is inserted in the right arm, just above the elbow, and is detected with equipment at the hospital.
The test program is voluntary, and will be free to the 280 patients invited to participate, all of whom are suffering from chronic diseases and are frequently treated at the hospital. The rationale seems logical enough, as those with chronic conditions are more likely to suffer something serious enough to leave them unable to communicate. The initial, or "altruistic" goals are to help avoid mistakes like missed drug interactions or bad diagnoses.
Okay, while I'm not saying that there aren't positive aspects to this idea, there are a couple of things, however, that don't quite jibe right when you look a good look at this. Horizon vice-president and chief medical officer Dr. Richard Popiel confirmed the project was being conducted for the next two years to gauge whether or not to expand the program, yet neither Horizon nor VeriChip Corporation, the manufacturer of the chips and detection equipment, make any mention of the project on their websites. What's more, Hackensack University Medical Center already have the detection equipment, as they are part of VeriChip's development program. Don't know about you, but I almost don't want to know about what other kinds of tests have been going on.
Some of the information for this article came from Start the Revolution:
http://www.starttherevolution.org/archives/2006/g%20-%20july/Insurers%20To%20Test%20Implantable%20Microchip.htm
VeriChip Corporation: http:www.verichipcorp.com
and
Horizon Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Jersey: http://www.horizon-bcbsnj.com
Over the last twenty-five years, and especially in the last five, the only similarity I have found with the science fiction I grew up reading and watching is not the kind everybody was lining up for. Ignoring the partisan bickering that translates into nothing being done, the Earth is slowly being rendered into an original episode Star Trek backdrop. Sure, lifespans are increasing, but what reward awaits all that progress? You have your cake, yes, but what are you going to eat it off of?
Where we had visions of hovercars and 3D holographic TVs, what we have are more surveillance gear and a hell of a lot less checks and balances. While it is easy to dismiss this as more liberal crackpot panic button-mashing, at the same token, it is just as easy to ask where the line is, and how long ago was it that we passed it by?
Most of us have probably by now read stories about research being done with ultra-small or easily invisible microchips. First, it was retailers, experimenting with chips woven into fabric, for purposes of inventory tracking and loss prevention. Then, the talk switched to tagging military personnel, for troop movement analysis and location tracking. Admit it, there was just the slightest of chills the first time you read the words "microchip," "tracking," and "human" in the same sentence. In a newspaper. A real newspaper.
This leads us to, of all places, Hackensack, New Jersey. Not exactly the location I had in mind for something like this breaking out. In a test program being conducted be Horizon Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Jersey and Hackensack University Medical Center, 280 patients will be implanted with microchips that would allow ER staff to bring up a patient's medical record if they were unable to communicate. The chip, roughly the size of a grain of rice, is inserted in the right arm, just above the elbow, and is detected with equipment at the hospital.
The test program is voluntary, and will be free to the 280 patients invited to participate, all of whom are suffering from chronic diseases and are frequently treated at the hospital. The rationale seems logical enough, as those with chronic conditions are more likely to suffer something serious enough to leave them unable to communicate. The initial, or "altruistic" goals are to help avoid mistakes like missed drug interactions or bad diagnoses.
Okay, while I'm not saying that there aren't positive aspects to this idea, there are a couple of things, however, that don't quite jibe right when you look a good look at this. Horizon vice-president and chief medical officer Dr. Richard Popiel confirmed the project was being conducted for the next two years to gauge whether or not to expand the program, yet neither Horizon nor VeriChip Corporation, the manufacturer of the chips and detection equipment, make any mention of the project on their websites. What's more, Hackensack University Medical Center already have the detection equipment, as they are part of VeriChip's development program. Don't know about you, but I almost don't want to know about what other kinds of tests have been going on.
Some of the information for this article came from Start the Revolution:
http://www.starttherevolution.org/archives/2006/g%20-%20july/Insurers%20To%20Test%20Implantable%20Microchip.htm
VeriChip Corporation: http:www.verichipcorp.com
and
Horizon Blue Cross and Blue Shield of New Jersey: http://www.horizon-bcbsnj.com
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