Stemming The Tide of Illness

There are so many reasons I think a lot of science is a waste of government, and public money. NASA is often under my fire. However I'm not completely against scientific studies. There is a lot of commotion around stem cell research. Mostly becuase of how they get the stem cells. I understand both sides of the arguments really, however, that is one area that I think at least has merit in its usefullness and future benefits to humanity. Scientists are now studying a way to cure blindness through stem cell research. That's fantastic. I can't imagine not being able to see the world around me. I can imagine not being able to hear it as my hearing loss excellerates at an alarming rate every year. I know it will be gone completely at some point. It isn't as bad as being blind, but it's bad enough. I hope they find a way to cure deafness as well. As I get older my eyes grow weaker, and weaker too. I think when you see those types of things happening to you, you begin to appreciate the medical, and scientific advances more. It's easy to decry such things when you're young and healthy, or haven't had anyone around you deeply effected by such losses, or born with them. It's wonderful that we have so much now we didn't have even twenty years ago. Cures for things that would be certain death. Treatments that go beyond leeches and 'oh well' it happens. Even things such as the flu would be devestating in the early part of the last century and we hardly bat an eye at them anymore. It makes you wonder what things will seem like 'nothing' in another fifty years. I hope I'm around to find out.