I read the book, and this is only the start. For a piece of fiction, it is hitting way to close for comfort! (pac)
The Delray Beach, Fla.-based company VeriChip Corp. has announced plans to implant 200 Alzheimer's patients in Palm Beach County with radio-frequency identification chips as part of a pilot study to test the new technology. According to VeriChip's CEO Scott Silverman, the VeriMed chip will eventually provide peace of mind to the families of Alzheimer's patients by providing a safety net in case a patient should get lost. The chip is not a GPS device, Silverman emphasized, and cannot be used to track people in whom it is implanted. All the participants in the two-year study are volunteers, and Silverman expressed pleasure with the study's reception so far.
The article is and should be a warning of things to come. The cancer scare is obviously not putting off too many plans.
The article is and should be a warning of things to come. The cancer scare is obviously not putting off too many plans.
4 comments:
Consumers are seen as expendable items.
If cigarettes are described as 'delivery devices' for addictive compounds, then consumers are simply receptacles for consumer items...no thought required.
I have got to wonder if a view of consumable consumers is valid. Not that I am questioning your point that producers view the consumer as the lowest common denominator, no, I agree there. However it's in the producers best interest to maintain an existing consumer base instead of grooming new ones to replace attrition. I know that runs contra to the actions of the cigarette companies, however it must be noted that early on, they didn't know that the product was so dangerous. I have to think that their action were a reaction to the discovery that the product was toxic. I am not explaining it away now. I think some of the marketing practices were and are reprehensible, and the industry as a whole is morally bankrupt. I just have to think though, coming as I do from a manufacturing background, that viewing the consumer as a means to an end and not the end seems counter productive.
That's a good point you raise, and as my characters discuss in the mallcity sequel 'Return to Mallcity', it's a case of balancing the pharma profits to be gained from cigarette induced diseases (for eg), and the average ('voluntary') spending/consumer power of a healthy consumer. Considered like this, long term illness can often be far, far more profitable....and you know how the 'Cover-Up council' works...industry profits always come first!
Shaun, now I just had a scary though. You use the term 'voluntary' spending
and I thought...how odd, is there anything else....and then it hit me. Involuntary spend. What would that entail? Then I wondered how many companies like cigarettes and maybe even the auto companies have substantial holdings in the medical field. Am I being paranoid by suggesting that these companies may actually manufacture their own consumers?
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