HEALTHY ONLINE

The very first thing Adam and Eve did after acquiring the wisdom to distinguish between good and evil was to cover themselves up and hide from view. Privacy was the first concern of a newly enlightened humanity. The punishment for acquiring this peculiarly human self-awareness was harsh, swift and unforgiving. Yes, it is legend, but you should never underestimate the genius of an author whose collection of stories has been the number one global bestseller for almost six millennia and counting. Today, a new legend is forming. If we agree to take off our loincloth and step out from the shadows of our privacy, the eternal punishment of blood, toil, sweat and tears will be rescinded by a new generation of supreme beings. Is it possible for us to unbite the proverbial apple? Is it possible for us to revert to naked grazing among the magnificent bounty offered by the new gods, completely oblivious to benevolent surveillance and unobtrusive discipline? Our government thinks so. The billionair...

If someone was sitting on a veranda somewhere in the Alpha Centauri system, reading about health care in America of planet Earth, one would most likely conclude that the family of viruses known as the common cold are destroying a health system already crippled by a glut of poorly educated physicians practicing their miserable craft on a slow-moving and slow-thinking bovine population. One would also be likely to feel optimistic, because, America is bravely tackling its health care problems head on, and a resolution is all but imminent. Relieved, the sympathetic observer would take another sip from his refreshingly molten krillonade, and fast forward to the intergalactic sports section. As our Alpha Centauri Aamericanophile surely gleaned from far away media reports, retail medicine is the fastest growing and most talked about innovation in American health care. Retail medicine comes in two closely related, yet very different flavors: cramped little rooms in the back of brick and mor...