Randall Parker makes an interesting point here: "Imagine you could be told two or three or four decades in advance what you are going to die from. Imagine a doctor could tell you that you will die from pancreatic failure 20 years from now barring the development of stem cell therapies or bioengineering technologies for growth of replacement organs. Would it change your attitude toward the urgency of medical research? I've been predicting for some years that advances in biomedical testing will lead to the ability to predict occurrence many diseases decades in advance and that this will change public attitudes toward biomedical research funding. ... Since advances in testing are happening and will continue to happen for decades to come I'm predicting a growth in the size of interest groups in support of the development of stem cell research, gene therapy, growth of replacement organs, and other cures for diseases." Food for thought.

Link: http://www.futurepundit.com/archives/003370.html