Looking out of my New York Citywindow this morning at the meager 6 inches of snow on the ground I cant help wondering if precision medicine in the foreseeable futurewill be able todo a better job than precision weather forecasting today.

Weather forecasters, using all the tools of modern science, blew it big time. Meteorologists thought they had enough data and sufficiently sophisticated models to accurately predict a huge snowstorm. Using this knowledge politicians and other experts thought they could prevent a major disaster from taking place. Instead they created their own disaster. Here in NYC the entire city was shut down overfears ofthe dangers of a once in a century blizzard.

Is the human body simpler than the weather? Will we be able to accurately predict, prevent, and treat serious diseases in the future? What arethe consequences when precision medicine blows a major forecast?

Dont get me wrong: precision medicinehas a great future and is not going to disappear. But we need to think about the unintended consequences and harms it can cause. We need to be optimistic but our optimism should not be unbridled. Wemust try tokeep in mind all the things that can go wrong.

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Can Precision Medicine Do Better Than Precision Weather?