Innovationsight

In June 2000, Tony Blair and Bill Clinton held a joint press conference at which they announced the completion of the Human Genome projects the availability of a first draft of the genome or genetic code of the human being. This milestone, one of the greatest scientific achievements in human history, means that today our generation may well be facing a quiet revolution which will change our current understanding of medicine, ushering in what is generally known among the scientific community as personalized medicine.

This new situation will allow the progressive application of treatments preventative and curative based primarily on individuals’ genetic information. This contrasts with the situation to date where it has been based on symptoms, in a system where the doctor’s opinion and experience were of vital importance. The promise that personalized medicine holds out is for an improvement in the effectiveness of treatments and a reduction in side effects, since they will, a priori, be targeted at those individuals, and will have a better response.

For the time being, in a ten-year timescale (the period for which the forecasts in this study are based), we will not see individualized treatments for each person, but mainly segmented treatments, targeted at groups of individuals with similar genetic features. This marks, nonetheless, a substantial change over the prevailing concept at present of “one-size-fits-all” treatments and drugs, under which all research has centered on finding pharmaceuticals for a wide majority of the population suffering from specific ailments.

These changes have been made possible by the enormous advances achieved in both molecular treatment and in information technology1, enabling the Human Genome Project to be completed several years ahead of schedule. These factors have also brought the cost of sequencing each of the basic components of the genome down from $2 to almost 1 cent in the last eight years. Scientists are even talking of the possibility of obtaining a person’s complete genetic code at a cost of less than €1,000 in coming years, possibly months, as a result of the application of technologies such as biocomputing, sequencers and biochips.

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