Book Review - Failure to Cure: A Health Care Conspiracy

About the Book 
What is the Federal government’s real position on life extending research? Have there ever been any Federal studies or Federal endorsements of anti-aging or age-enhancing treatments?

Almost immediately after the election, the administration lifted the Bush presidency’s ban on stem cell studies, opening up the field for great scientific advancement and potentially life-saving research that would unlock the secrets to longer and healthier lives. Unexpectedly, a federal district judge overruled this decision in August of 2010, claiming that it violated a ban on federal money being used to destroy embryos.

This turned the National Institutes of Health upside down, interrupting their work and precluding any advances and potential discoveries that might have been made as a result. Was this a premature lifting of the ban by an idealist administration that did not understand the long-term social benefit implications of such a decision?

While the ban seemed to indicate right wing morality at play, author James David Frank suggests something much more sinister at play in his thought-provoking political thriller, Failure to Cure: A Health Care Conspiracy.  Failure to Cure implies, through a complex plot of plausible political fiction, that perhaps “the system” had reversed the Presidential mandate. The “system,” comprised of politicians and a network of secret government agents who work behind the scenes to control the true functions and objectives of our Federal bureaucracy, interrupted the stem cell legislation in an effort to maintain the overall governmental conspiracy to limit the average age of American life.  

By preventing discovery of how disease regenerates in the body and the advance of overall reparatory regenerative medicine, “the system” can keep the information from becoming public and thereby prevent millions from life-enhancing and, moreover, life-extending treatments. Could there be a great deal of money made from the advancement of one man’s discovery of a cure for cancer? It could make one man, or one company, enormously wealthy. However, is there an even greater financial gain for a government who has knowingly suppressed the cure, thereby keeping the average age of American life static? It depends on whose money you are counting and the scope of the implied benefit population around the globe. Could a treatment that would extend human life actually be too costly for the government to allow to be brought forward?

Although Frank’s novel is presumably fiction, it is inspired by real events and real headlines while pointing to the conspiratorial possibility of these theories. His political and medical fiction in this culturally significant work may very well be our reality in today’s complex economic times. Failure to Cure seamlessly fuses the headlines, conspiracy theories, and a plausible level of truth to address the health care issues that we face as a nation.

My Take on the Book

This book was the type of book that kept me on the edge of my seat from the beginning to the end. While the novel was very personal in nature, as a reader you are placed in the midst of the health care debate in current day America. This book take the social ills of today and makes them even more real, the crux though, were the scenarios shared within the book, as they make you take pause and think about what ifs and how you would choose based on what you know.

Overall, the book was well constructed and written and the characters were perfectly aligned to set up the murder mystery/political thriller that the book is.The author does a great job at depicting scenes and allowing the reader to live out the book instead of just reading it.

A great book that I would highly recommend!

All opinions expressed in this review are my own and not influenced in any way by the company.  Any product claim, statistic, quote or other representation about a product or service should be verified with the manufacturer or provider. Please refer to this site's Disclaimer  for more information. I have been compensated or given a product free of charge, but that does not impact my views or opinions.
 
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
New to the Divadom or to Dad of Divas Reviews?
Please Subscribe to my RSS Feed! Subscribe in a reader
Questions?Drop me a line at dadofdivas@gmail.com