major public investments are directed at only in the longer term. While it makes a References cancer treatments and thus at attempts compelling case for these promises, it also 1 Nanobiotechnology: Responsible Action on Issues in Society and Ethics: http://nanobio-raise.org/ 2 Mauro Magnani Eythrocyte Engineering for Drug Delivery and Targeting. New York: Kluwer, 2003. Nanomedicine further to reduce mortality in developed asks for our patience. And as with all basic 3 Volker Wagner and Axel Zweck Nanomedizin: Innovationspotenziale in Hessen für Medizintechnik und societies where it is already comparatively research, something is bound to come of Pharmazeutische Industrie Wiesbaden: Hessisches Ministerium für Wirtschaft, 2006. • A Brief History of Nanomedicine low. it, though not perhaps the full mastery of 4 Robert A. Freitas (1999): Nanomedicine, Volume I: Basic Capabilities, Georgetown, TX: Landes Bioscience. • Theranostics 5 physiological complexities that is envisioned Cancer NANOTECHNOLOGY: Going Small for Big Advances – Using Nanotechnology to Advance Cancer Diagnosis, • Targeted Drug-Delivery Prevention and Treatment. Washington, DC: U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES, National Nanomedical ethics should not serve to in the name of theranostics, individualised Institutes of Health, National Cancer Institute, 2004. • Polymer Therapeutics validate an uncertain future, for example, medicine, and cell repair. Some of its 6 Nanomedicine: Nanotechnology for Health – European Technology Platform. Brussels: European Commission, • Regenerative Medicine by assuming too readily an increase of most important contributions will consist Research DG, 2006, p. 12. • Ethical and societal issues 7 Ibid., p. 10, see also p. 6 and especially p. 12. diagnostic powers or an impact on life- of progress in instrumentation and analytic 8 Nanomedicine: An ESF – European Medical Research Councils (EMRC) Forward Look report. Strasbourg: European expectancy. Instead, it might contribute methods that is now considered primarily Science Foundation, 2006. to public deliberation on the research a stepping-stone towards bigger and better 9 Like synthetic biology, nanomedicine is thus poised to become an off-shoot of nanotechnology that claims its own, The aim of this briefing paper is to provide at least partly separate identity and integrity. – Two of the authors of the ESF-report reflect on this quite explicitly, agenda for nanomedicine. Once one starts things. concise, correct and balanced information to see Ringsdorf and Duncan "nanogames gaining ground" 2006. Nanomedical sectors questioning its primary focus on cancer and 10 The European Technology Platform subsumes new pharmaceuticals under "targeted delivery": "Seamlessly advance public debate among consumers, • Drug delivery cardiovascular diseases, one might have to One should therefore not expect connecting Diagnostics, Targeted Delivery and Regenerative Medicine: Diagnostics, targeted delivery and media, policy makers, producers and • Biomaterials consider the very definitions of illness and nanomedicine to revolutionise medicine. regenerative medicine constitute the core disciplines of nanomedicine. The EuropeanTechnology Platform on researchers as part of the European • In vivo imaging NanoMedicine acknowledges and wishes to actively support research at the interface between its three science 1 health and the medicalisation of society. It is one promising avenue by which areas." This research at the interface can establish theranostics (p. 9). Commission-funded Nanobio-RAISE project. • In vitro diagnostics Similarly, one might consider the metaphors medicine can advance. At the end of the 11 Alfred Nordmann "Knots and Strands: An Argument for Productive Disillusionment," Journal of Medicine and It results from the combined contributions of • Active implants we use to describe the human being or the day, it will have contributed new treatment- Philosophy, 32:3, 2007, pp. 217-236. natural and social scientists, industrialists, and • Drugs & therapy 12 ESF-report, p. 11. changing boundaries of human bodies as options for certain diseases, some new 13 This constructive principle also distinguishes nanomedicine (as a kind of nanotechnology) from biotechnology which governmental and public interest organisations the body's own tissue or insulin, for example, nanomedicines, better imaging-techniques is developing and deploying proteins as active agents. across Europe. It is intended to provide course, all kinds of medical devices profit from might be generated outside the body or by and other diagnostic tools. These will 14 ETP, p. 16. information and does not represent the views the miniaturisation of electronic components 15 Matthias Adam "What to expect from rational drug design,"Expert Opinion on Drug Discovery 2 (6), 2007, way of an implanted device. add significantly to the currently available or policy of the European Commission or any as they move beyond micro to nano. This NanoBio-RAISE Co-ordination office: 773-776. arsenal of therapies and medicines, raising 16 Joachim Schummer "The Impact of Nanotechnologies on Developing Countries," in Fritz Allhoff, Patrick Lin,, James other body. affects diagnostic tools, pace-makers, Julianalaan 67 Conclusion similar ethical and societal concerns as Moor, John Weckert, eds., Nanoethics: The Ethical and Social Implications of Nanotechnology, Wiley, 2007. “cameras in a pill,” etc. Nanoparticulate 2628 BC Delft 17 mean more people on Earth. But how many A 2007 nanomedical bulletin offered the did the medical advances of the past. Andreas Jordan "From Science to Business in 15 Years" in the Proceedings of EuroNanoForum 2005: Introduction pharmaceutical agents can penetrate cells The Netherlands Nanotechnology and the Health of the EU Citizen in 2020, edited by Michael Mason, Sophia Fantechi, Renzo 22 more people can the Earth sustain?" In Ethical and societal issues following news item: "Working with an Demonstrations of efficacy have to be Tomellini, Brussels: EC DG Research, 2006, p. 16. A broad array of present and future research more effectively as well as being able to t +31 (0)15 278 66 26 a similar vein, the European Technology Traditionally, medical ethics is patient- and organic semiconductor, researchers at considered together with physiological and 18 The European Group on Ethics in Science and New Technologies to the European Commission "Opinion on the developments are generally lumped together cross the blood-brain-barrier. After injecting f +31 (0)15 278 23 55 Platform notes that one large impact of treatment-centred rather than research- the University of Arkansas have fabricated environmental side-effects and general ethical aspects of Nanomedicine (Opinion N° 21)," January 17, 2007, section 5.5.1, p. 57. as “nanotechnology.” A common feature is only nanoparticles into tumours, these can be [email protected] 19 While the European Technology Platform considers regenerative medicine one of nanomedicine's three core nanomedicine will be "increased costs of and disease-centred. In other words, most and tested two similar but slightly different quality-of-life issues, comparing all of these disciplines, the ESF's Forward Look treats it only under the heading of new materials (in particular, scaffolding for that they are concerned with large and small stimulated electromagnetically from outside www.nanobio-raise.org social security systems due to ageing of medical ethics is focused on doctor-patient biosensors that can measure physiological to alternative treatment options. And like all tissue growth and repair). The US-report on Cancer Nanotechnology does not refer to it at all. things where at least some relevant measures the body – by emitting heat, the stimulated population."23 relations, on end-of-life decisions, on signs. Integrated into 'smart' fabrics – disease-oriented research, it requires public 20 ETP, p. 6. are in the nanometre range (10-9 to 10-7 particles can then destroy the tumour 21 Paul Miller and James Wilsdon “The man who wants to live forever” in Paul Miller and James Wilsdon (eds.) Better resource-allocation, on treatment choices, garments with wireless technology – the deliberation on which diseases should be metres) and thus in the size-range of DNA- cells. Antibacterial surfaces incorporating Humans? The Politics of Human Enhancement and Life Extension, London: DEMOS, 2006, pp. 51-58. It is important to be clear about the informed consent, and the like. Biomedical sensors will be able to monitor a patient's prioritised in the context of global health 22 Ivan Amato Nanotechnology - Shaping the World Atom by Atom, Washington: National Science and Technology molecules or viruses. More stringent definitions photocatalytic or biocidal nanoparticles reduce achievable goals of nanomedicine that are in research becomes significant only as it respiration rate and body temperature in care. Council, Interagency Working Group on Nanoscience, Engineering and Technology, 1999, p. 8. require that nanotechnological research be the risk of infection in doctors’ offices and 23 ETP, p. 24. the public interest. Popular fascination with enters clinical trials. Accordingly, medical real time."26 In many ways, this appears restricted to the scientific investigation and public buildings. Portable testing kits allow 24 Richard Jones Soft Machines Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004. envisioned technologies of life extension ethics has been rather indifferent to the to be nanotechnology at its best and is 25 Jean-Pierre