On the recordJune 30, 1999
in American dramatist Tennessee Williams' play of the 1950's, ``Cat On a Hot Tim Roof'', ``Big Daddy,'' fearing that a tumor found in his body is cancerous, speaks of ``a man not having a pig's advantage.'' He refers to the human race's unique ability to conceive of its own mortality. Truly, the number of men and women throughout the world daily battling illness and disability is a constant reminder of the reality that humanity is at war with disease and death. What Big Daddy did not acknowledge, and also what most of us often fail to recognize, is that the human ability to conceive of our mortality does not confine us to the status of the disadvantaged. Instead, it affords us an advantage in terms of our capacity to treat and even cure disease should we focus our resources--combining our intellectual faculties with financial and technological resources in the biomedical field--toward the common goal of fighting disease.
Source
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