Finders Keepers, Losers weepers.....
Readers,
In the novel "Next" by Michael Crichton, the book begins with the story of Frank Burnet who contracted an aggresive form of leukemia and underwent four years of intese treatment. He is later told that he needs to come back in for "testing" and is led to believe that the cancer has returned. He continues to attend these checkups for the next four years. He later learns that checkups were a pretext for researching the genetic basis of his successful response to treatment, and that the physician's had sold the rights in Frank's cells to BioGen, a biotechnology company. The book opens with Frank suing the University for unauthorized misuse of his cells unsuccessfully. The judge in the case rules that the cells were "waste" and that the university could dispose of as it wished.
The term emminent domain is defined as the inherent power of the state to seize a citizen'a private property, or seize a citizen's rights in property with due monetary compensation, but without the owner's consent. The property is taken either for government use or by delegation to third parties who will devote it to public or civic use or, in some cases, economic development.
So readers, do you see the government owning our bodies in the near future? Do you see them possibly utilizing "eminent domain" for the greater good of society? Can you think of a situation that you would support excercising eminent domain over another person and their body? What are your thoughts on this topic? Do share.
In the novel "Next" by Michael Crichton, the book begins with the story of Frank Burnet who contracted an aggresive form of leukemia and underwent four years of intese treatment. He is later told that he needs to come back in for "testing" and is led to believe that the cancer has returned. He continues to attend these checkups for the next four years. He later learns that checkups were a pretext for researching the genetic basis of his successful response to treatment, and that the physician's had sold the rights in Frank's cells to BioGen, a biotechnology company. The book opens with Frank suing the University for unauthorized misuse of his cells unsuccessfully. The judge in the case rules that the cells were "waste" and that the university could dispose of as it wished.
The term emminent domain is defined as the inherent power of the state to seize a citizen'a private property, or seize a citizen's rights in property with due monetary compensation, but without the owner's consent. The property is taken either for government use or by delegation to third parties who will devote it to public or civic use or, in some cases, economic development.
So readers, do you see the government owning our bodies in the near future? Do you see them possibly utilizing "eminent domain" for the greater good of society? Can you think of a situation that you would support excercising eminent domain over another person and their body? What are your thoughts on this topic? Do share.
posted by Erin at
8:28 AM
2 Comments:
Readers, I am very interested to hear your view on the topic of eminent domain. We have heard stories on the news where a citizen owned a peice of land that an entity wanted to expand their buisness or where the governement offered a settlement to a homeowner to relocate so that their house can be torn down for say, a museum to be constructed.Yet rarely do we hear of a hospital forcefully taking the blood or tissues of someone. I cannot say that I agree with the incident that occured in the novel Next or the judge's ruling. (Read the book)In a nutshell a ruling was made that the tissue samples that were taken from a male patient legally become property of the hospital that conducted the tests on him. They later sold his tissues to a independent lab for the sum of 3 million dollars of which they did not compensate the patient.
Though I do not believe that a hospital should have automatic ownership of your body and it's organs, even if it is considered medical waste, I can't help but think of possible uses of eminent domain in the future.
What if a patient came into the hospital for testing and was it was discovered that the blood their body pumped held some type of antibody that could be used to create the cure for AIDS. So the hospital approaces the patient and requests permission to harvest samples of this persons blood. They refuse. Now if their body holds the cure for some major disease such as AIDS or cancer, then I am all for the hospital going to court and forcing the patient to allow the procedure to be done. Do you agree or diagree with me? It kind of reminds me of the case of the young boy that contracted cancer and the parents refused to make him undergo treatment. Later after going on the run, the couple was commanded by law to check their son into a hospital for cancer treatment. What do you think of this? Where do we draw the line? Is the government overstepping their boundaries?
Very thoughtful. I am glad that Crichton is writing fiction (mostly). I do not want to see this country get into a debate about who actually owns their own body and cells.
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