There is no real
controversy between the use of prosthetics and politics. The only issue that
slows down the release of prosthetics is the time it takes for the government
to approve the prosthetic to be distributed to the public. However, like all
medical treatments that is understandable. You wouldn’t want the FDA to release
a medicine that has detrimental side effects. Same goes for prosthetics; an
artificial limb may malfunction and do something harmful like uncontrollably
increase the grip when holding something delicate such as a baby or the battery
may be corrosive and may harm the user. Usually these issues are not a problem
for artificial limbs but as stated earlier in this blog prosthetics aren’t only
artificial limbs. Most prosthetics that take a long time to be approved by the
government usually require very invasive surgery like brain-computer implants
or artificial spinal nerve biofilm.
Another thing that
thwarts the release of a prosthetic to the general public is funding. Funding
is highly essential for prosthetics. Usually the development requires a lot of
money due to moving parts, development of miniaturized computers, animal
experiments, and human prototyping models before the actual human experiments.
In the case of an artificial limb, a limb may cost thousands of dollars. The
prototype must be developed and fine-tuned before through experimentation
before it may be made for human experimentation.
I couldn’t imagine
the public having an issue with the development of prosthetics. I would imagine
the only thought that would cross an individual’s mind when seeing a prosthetic
is a sense of curiosity of how the disability may have occurred or how cool the
prosthetic is. Besides the restoration of function to the prosthetic user I
believe patients psychologically feel a sense of relief their disability no
longer singles them out from the general public.
