"treat people who are living now"

Why I care about gene studies for mental illness:

"We've been stumbling in the dark for most of our history" of bipolar research, said gene expert Dr. Francis McMahon of NIMH. But "these kinds of studies ... will really give us the chance to reason from biological insights back to the patient."

...And not just in some far-distant future. The new gene studies, Sachs said, help give "a great potential to advance the field in our lifetimes and treat people who are living now."