As the author points out in this book, the quickest way to get a diagnosis of prostate cancer is to screen for it; the same notion applies to many other diseases and conditions. With the advent of the technological age, doctors are now able to see more than before and are therefore quicker to diagnose diseases and cancers early. As Welch explains, the problem is that not every disease or cancer will kill you; some cancers will persist, but never cause harm. This therefore leads to the screening of cancers that were never going to kill a patient, which end up being detected and treated early, thus giving credit to early detection as a success. As Welch explains, most illnesses and injuries that take a natural course, without medical intervention, usually heal on their own. This is problematic because it creates the idea that medical intervention is useful and necessary, when this is not always the case. In general, as a society, the benefits of medical care have been overstated, while its harms have been largely ignored. If Welchs' instructions were followed, further examination of the effect of screenings and tests would be the new medical standard.