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The human cost of neurotechnology failure

nature.com

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Re: The human cost of neurotechnology failure

#91

Post by skissane »

haskellandchill wrote: post #87
skissane wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The lengths they go to score another fix—stabbing people, robbing family members, selling themselves, etc. Would they do that if the government just gave them the drug they are addicted to for free? I don’t think so. Is the real problem then the addiction, or the public policy context in which the addiction exists? Of course, I wouldn’t want to be addicted to opioids, even if the government gave them to me for free…

Methadone/Suboxone are opioids prescribed for addiction and are often free through low income programs. If they were made more accessible would that solve the crisis? I don’t think so. It’s hard to get to the stage where you accept them as a necessary solution and are still in the dangerous area of trying to taper with unknown quality substances. High quality government heroin/pills and supervised usage would likely…

> Methadone/Suboxone are opioids prescribed for addiction and are often free through low income programs. If they were made more accessible would that solve the crisis? I don’t think so.

It is unsurprising that if a person is addicted to substance A, trying to substitute it with substance B, which has different properties (even if chemically related to A), doesn't always work. The real solution is to supply them, legally, in pharmaceutical quality, and for consumption under trained supervision (whenever safety demands that), the actual drug they are addicted to, not some substitute.

> High quality government heroin/pills and supervised usage would likely work but it’s clear the US would never consider that an option.

Okay, but if you aren't willing to seriously consider every possible solution to a crisis, that makes your stubbornness a major part of its cause. Government drug policy is a huge contributor to the crisis, and if the government isn't willing to make major changes to its drug policies, the crisis is likely to continue, and the government deserves every blame for that.

Re: The human cost of neurotechnology failure

#92

Post by bombolo »

manholio wrote: post #84
icelancer wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Without some solution like this, it's hard to imagine any non-essential neural implants really taking off: who would ever buy a neural lace from a startup — or even an established company like Google who might just lose interest — if there was no guarentee of patches and maintenance? Speaking as someone who lived with chronic, daily, horrific pain for years before a surgery miraculously solved most of my problems…

> I would have eventually signed up. You could have signed up only if excessive regulatory burden wouldn't have killed or prevented the startup from existing. I find the whole "medical startups should support their patients post bankruptcy" train of thought very disingenuous: as long as we as a society make no public concerted effort to cure these people and leave them to the mercy of the markets, then surely some re…

Then they should escrow all of their intellectual property and at the very least release it all to public domain the instant they stop supporting the device.

Re: The human cost of neurotechnology failure

#93

Post by manholio »

bombolo wrote: post #92
manholio wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I would have eventually signed up. You could have signed up only if excessive regulatory burden wouldn't have killed or prevented the startup from existing. I find the whole "medical startups should support their patients post bankruptcy" train of thought very disingenuous: as long as we as a society make no public concerted effort to cure these people and leave them to the mercy of the markets, then surely some re…

Then they should escrow all of their intellectual property and at the very least release it all to public domain the instant they stop supporting the device.

I strongly doubt the issue preventing support for these patients is the intelectual property in general. Source code, I agree, but things like medical patents are irrelevant if you have to replace a battery cell in a custom form factor or chemistry that is no longer manufactured, per the article. The insurers actively fought the patient changing his own battery.

You also diminish the expected value of the startup because the ability to liquidate IP after comercial bankruptcy is a factor reducing risk - investors get at least something back. If you dictate confiscation of that IP, you also reduce the willingness to invest in what already is a very risky proposition. And that's how you get to a 3 trillion ponzi bubble in crypto that solves no problem, while similar investment into medical startups would create thousands of products, treatments and long term wealth.

Sorry, but no amount of downvotes will make me accept a clearly populist and virtue signaling approach that will actively harm patients and discourage investment in medical innovation.

Re: The human cost of neurotechnology failure

#94

Post by bombolo »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #50
_fat_santa wrote: post #4

There should be something similar to the FDIC for medical device manufacturers. If you're a customer of a bank and the bank goes under, the FDIC will step in to ensure continuity of operations and youre eventually taken up by another bank that buys the assets. For a company that makes medical devices, part of the bankrupcy process should be a 3rd party company coming in and taking over support and maintenance of the…

The software industry is fucked from the get-go - you sjould have the right to inspect all software im your body. After all, you have the right to read all patents. The idea that someone could have code bugs in my body, or a virus running on an implant, or put in functionality I didnt asl for, is basically about as abhorrent as slavery.

Security researchers have shown they can kill people with peacemakers if they get close enough to them.

Re: The human cost of neurotechnology failure

#95

Post by bombolo »

manholio wrote: post #93
bombolo wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then they should escrow all of their intellectual property and at the very least release it all to public domain the instant they stop supporting the device.

I strongly doubt the issue preventing support for these patients is the intelectual property in general. Source code, I agree, but things like medical patents are irrelevant if you have to replace a battery cell in a custom form factor or chemistry that is no longer manufactured, per the article. The insurers actively fought the patient changing his own battery. You also diminish the expected value of the startup bec…

So your solution is to just treat patients like garbage and shrug at them when your startup goes bankrupt? You want to protect overly rich VCs instead of the patients?

Virtue signalling? I call this "not being like dr Mengele"… if you think that's virtue signalling you are just a bad person.

Re: The human cost of neurotechnology failure

#96

Post by karteum »

> "People using the stimulator and their physicians could no longer access the proprietary software needed to recalibrate the device and maintain its effectiveness"

How is that even possible ? I would have expected that there would be proper regulations (either there is another company that would follow-up, or the aforementioned proprietary software would have to be open-sourced...)

Re: The human cost of neurotechnology failure

#97

Post by greggman3 »

skissane wrote: post #16
plastiquebeech wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We need to be very careful with brain implants designed to relieve pain, lest we repeat the mistakes which brought us the opioid crisis. I've seen videos at BCI conferences of deep brain stimulation implants which provide the patient with a "happy button" to relieve chronic pain/anxiety/depression/etc. They seem to work very well in a clinical setting, but the patient reactions make it clear that there will be an eno…

The “opioid crisis” is a crisis because (1) it is easy to accidentally kill yourself with opioids; (2) drug criminalisation makes recreational drug use a lot less safe than it could be were it legal and regulated I doubt overuse of a “happy button” brain implant is going to kill you; and I doubt it is going to end up in a similar legal situation to recreational drugs. So, whatever the negative impacts of overuse of s…

> drug criminalisation makes recreational drug use a lot less safe than it could be were it legal and regulated

This is debatable. Here's a legal drug that kills 3 million people a year

https://www.alcoholrehabguide.org/resources/medical-conditio...

Here's another that kills 7 million people per year

https://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/fast...

Note that I'm mostly for legalized drugs. I just have heard this data and I don't have an answer to it. My impression is I just take it on faith that less criminalization will be a net positive but I don't know that's for sure.

Re: The human cost of neurotechnology failure

#98

Post by stavros »

9wzYQbTYsAIc wrote: post #82
stavros wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why?

I believe that this document discusses some of the details of patient administered IV opiods in a hospital setting: https://www.cms.gov/Medicare/Provider-Enrollment-and-Certifi...

Right, but why limit a button that removes pain via direct brain stimulation?

Re: The human cost of neurotechnology failure

#99

Post by Jochim »

manholio wrote: post #93
bombolo wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then they should escrow all of their intellectual property and at the very least release it all to public domain the instant they stop supporting the device.

I strongly doubt the issue preventing support for these patients is the intelectual property in general. Source code, I agree, but things like medical patents are irrelevant if you have to replace a battery cell in a custom form factor or chemistry that is no longer manufactured, per the article. The insurers actively fought the patient changing his own battery. You also diminish the expected value of the startup bec…

> And that's how you get to a 3 trillion ponzi bubble in crypto that solves no problem, while similar investment into medical startups would create thousands of products, treatments and long term wealth.

I'm extremely glad that the types of people involved in crypto are in no way incentivised to do the same thing to the medical industry. Theranos was bad enough.

I'm not sure why you'd ever want to see crypto's web of scams and lies replicated in the medical industry. At least with crypto the harm is mainly limited to finances. When the grifters are peddling drugs and medical devices the consequences are much more dire.

> Sorry, but no amount of downvotes will make me accept a clearly populist and virtue signaling approach that will actively harm patients and discourage investment in medical innovation.

Not allowing bad actors free reign over people's health isn't populist or virtue signalling. The majority of these regulations were written in blood.

Re: The human cost of neurotechnology failure

#100

Post by concordDance »

bombolo wrote: post #95
manholio wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I strongly doubt the issue preventing support for these patients is the intelectual property in general. Source code, I agree, but things like medical patents are irrelevant if you have to replace a battery cell in a custom form factor or chemistry that is no longer manufactured, per the article. The insurers actively fought the patient changing his own battery. You also diminish the expected value of the startup bec…

So your solution is to just treat patients like garbage and shrug at them when your startup goes bankrupt? You want to protect overly rich VCs instead of the patients? Virtue signalling? I call this "not being like dr Mengele"… if you think that's virtue signalling you are just a bad person.

I believe he's clearly indicated that he think this is in the best interests of the patients, not the VCs. Not sure if it's a reading comprehension issue or if you're just trying to score points.

He wants the patients to actually get their devices that make their lives bearable rather than these devices continuing to remain theoretical.

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