Perspective: Armed to Fight for Medical Research; There Are Serious Concerns about the UK's Failure to Reverse a Decline in Medical Research. Dr Stephen Cutts, a Surgeon Working in the West Midlands, Laments the Demise of a Proud Tradition and Wonders Why the Emphasis Is on Death Rather Than Healing

Byline: Dr Stephen Cutts

Several months of depressing news from overseas was recently punctuated by the announcements of this year's Nobel Prize for medicine.

Another accolade for British science is nothing new.

This time the honours have been picked up by the inventor of the MRI scanner and our television screens have been filled with pictures of an old man grinning besides a glass of champagne.

But if the next generation of medical researchers are to maintain this impressive track record, it seems to me imperative that our attitude to this field must change.

Even at the dawn of a new century, medical research continues to be considered in charitable terms. Like the spiralling cost of health care itself, the medical research community is seen as one of the expensive shackles of Western lifestyle. Medical research costs money and a nation that fails to generate enough money cannot afford such expensive luxuries.

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Publication information: Article title: Perspective: Armed to Fight for Medical Research; There Are Serious Concerns about the UK's Failure to Reverse a Decline in Medical Research. Dr Stephen Cutts, a Surgeon Working in the West Midlands, Laments the Demise of a Proud Tradition and Wonders Why the Emphasis Is on Death Rather Than Healing. Contributors: Not available. Newspaper title: The Birmingham Post (England). Publication date: November 1, 2003. Page number: 8. © 2009 Birmingham Post & Mail Ltd. COPYRIGHT 2003 Gale Group.

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