Life-saving technologies that are not used to save lives

Abstract

A hundred years ago in July, thanks to the advancement of medical technology, the first human received the vaccine Bacille Calmette-Guérin—or BCG—to prevent tuberculosis (TB), a disease that killed at least 20% of the European population during the 19th century. Since then, hundreds of millions of lives have been saved by BCG, as well as other vaccinations for dangerous diseases. However, although TB is quite preventable and curable, it remains the leading cause of death from a single infectious agent in the world. It is an example of how humans can invent technologies to improve and save lives but fail to do so because of unevenly distributed resources, lack of media coverage, and other economic, political, and sociological realities that determine the uses and targets of technologies.