M e d i c i n e A ve 2 Communications Challenges of the Life Sciences Gilbert S. Omenn MD, PhD The life sciences have been growing in the public consciousness for several decades—reflecting the introduction of antibiotics in the 1940s, the proposal of the double-helix structure for DNA in 1953, the War on Cancer in the 1970s, the periodic influenza epidemics, and the race to sequence the human genome during the 1990s.1The US public has strongly supported investment in biomedical and behavioral research, based on high expectations of benefit through better healthcare and public health measures. Some life science developments have become embroiled in larger controversies, such as important advances in reproductive health, genetically engineered crops and foods, nanobiotechnology, and embryonic stem cell biology. Public attitudes and public advocacy have played significant roles in the Congressional and Presidential commitments to invest in the life sciences, including the doubling of the budget for the National Institutes of Health between 1998 and 2003 and the $10 billion addon it received as part of the 2009 economic stimulus 24
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