In Germs and the City, Peter W. Huber takes a long look at the history of public health and its shift toward “health care”:
Public authorities are ponderous and slow; the new germs are nimble and fast. Drug regulators are paralyzed by the knowledge that error is politically lethal; the new germs make genetic error — constant mutation — the key to their survival. The new germs don’t have to be smarter than our scientists, just faster than our lawyers.
(Emphasis mine.)
Read the whole article.