Between shopping for clothing that will make me super healthy and sitting on the couch all day watching a marathon of the TV show Scrubs, I’d choose the latter. I like my clothing simple, cheap and most importantly comfortable. The last thing I need is clothing that requires me figure to out which t-shirt prevents dengue fever.

But researchers are on a mission, a mission to make everyday clothing detectors of illnesses and disease.

In trial tests of the so-called ‘smart clothing’, the health conscious attire can ward off bugs, cigarette smoke, monitor ones heart rate and stop the common cold, which strangely enough doesn’t require the wearer to wash the outfit – which I think negates the whole purpose of avoiding the flu in the first place.

For the inner germaphobe and health nut in you, this may sound like the perfect way to avoid sickness, and for women it can detect early cases of breast cancer—but only if you’re stinking rich.

The current estimated cost for owning this health conscious clothing: $400 million and could reach as high as $700 million by 2010.

Yyyyyyyouch! I think my debt card just bit me.

Here’s an idea. Before we start creating expensive health related devices that could potentially save peoples lives, we should focus on creating some brand of universal health care so when people who actually need this technology can get it in a way without selling their soul to some higher (or lower) power.

Not too long from now my parents won’t be able to cover me with their health insurance plan and then either I’ll have to scramble to find other means of health insurance, or I’ll have to build my very own plastic bubble to live in to avoid all forms of diseases from the common cold to a fatal version of dengue fever.
—Eming Piansay