'Marty McFly' Makes Exciting Prediction About the Next 30 Years
When he starred in the 1985 hit film “Back to the Future,” actor Michael J. Fox’s character Marty McFly time traveled 30 years to Oct. 21, 2015. So on “Back to the Future Day,” Fox took the opportunity to share his thoughts on what the world might look like another three decades from now.
What is Parkinson’s Disease?
His prediction: a cure for Parkinson’s disease.
“Call me an optimist, but I believe that by 2045 we’ll find the cures we seek — especially because of all the smart, passionate people working to make it happen,” Fox wrote in a letter to the White House. “Doctors and researchers around the world are developing new tools to improve the diagnosis and treatment of brain diseases, to tailor treatments—for all illnesses—through precision medicine, and to make life better for millions of people. This truly is the stuff of the future.”
Fox was diagnosed with Parkinson’s in 1991, and in 1998 he disclosed his condition to the public. The condition affects an estimated one million people in the U.S., and five million worldwide, according to the Michael J. Fox Foundation’s website. The rate of Parkinson’s in America is expected to double by 2030 due to the aging population. While the National Parkinson’s Foundation notes that the disease itself is not fatal, in 2010 the Center for Disease Control rated complications from Parkinson’s as the 14th cause of death in the United States.
Fox sees that changing.
“We can’t all be brain scientists, but all of us can get involved,” he wrote. “Together, we’ll make neurological illness a thing of the past. And if we all eventually get hoverboards, well — that’s a bonus.”
On “Back to the Future Day,” the White House is hosting series of online conversations with innovators in the technology and medical fields. The White House has funded research into precision medicine and mapping the human brain, both of which “could lead to radical new treatments or even a cure for Parkinson’s and related conditions,” according to Fast Company.
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