The OP makes a good point:
Don’t get me wrong, I’m aware of the wonders modern medicine has done for humanity, but at the same time, it feels like we’re so limited in what we can do when it comes to medical help.
Like, a pandemic just hit the world, and we can’t provide a vaccine for at least a year? I’m aware that there are limitations and logistics that go into Maki gg a vaccine, but man, it sucks to think that we’re that limited to combating a globally wide spread disease.
And we’re so helpless against cancer, I’m aware of chemo therapy and that there’s been plenty of people who recover, but there are also people who aren’t as fortunate. It kind of sucks to think that after all this time, there are times you can’t really do anything about cancer.
Then there’s the fact we have such a limited understanding of some parts of the human body, like how we know so little about how the human brain actually operates, or that we don’t even know where to begin with restoring something as crucial as eye sight.
And some people are just paralyzed forever, why don’t we have treatment for nerve damage?
I understand that each of these questions have a clear explanation for the state of their research, but my general question comes down to, why does “modern medicine” feel so much more limited than what I would normally think it’d be by our times? Perhaps it’s just the perception around the term “modern medicine” but it sucks to see that we’re so helpless against certain things.
And of course the big brained cope in the replies:
If you had to live for a year in the 1100s, see people die of condition we can cure now, see people suffer condition we can manage easily, you'd be a believer, but you can only read about them dryly and think something is lost there
I mean you could also apply this reasoning to things like racism, sexism, etc. "Bro at least it's way better than a thousand years ago HURR DURR."
Meanwhile you got countries like China that effectively stopped a major virus within its borders and you have Cuba developing a lung cancer vaccine and curing HIV in an infant along with developing its own vaccines that don't rely on needles (cuz of the blockade) or super sub-zero freezers (like the US vaccine).
I understand that some of the science is "hard." But my god, I can't help but think we would have cured (like actually cure, not "treat") so many things by now if it weren't for our fucked up system.
Two obstacles to modern medical advances.
Firstly - political obstruction. Politicians aren't experts in medicine and are more dependent on advice from lobbying groups than scientists so legislation ends up obstructing the effectiveness of research. (An obvious example here would be STEM cell research which was put on hold for decades due to moral panics from religious groups but one I'm more angry about is antivaxers successfully lobbying parliament to ban the use of Thiomersal, a fungicide with no known ill effects on humans, effectively limiting the shelf life of all vaccines).
Secondly - IP law. Do you know how many types of Next-gen Genome Sequencing exist? The techniques used in each one are held exclusively by the company that funded research into so all research into NGS is dedicated to producing new, legally distinct techniques. As a result the general efficiency of whole genome sequencing has stalled because instead of scientists iterating on what works, the finest minds in genetics are all pooled into figuring out how to do the same thing but slightly different.
Thanks, finally another thoughtful response.