Engineered organs that could end transplant waiting lists, abortion pills on demand and mass-marketing military drones that will revolutionize warfare are among those listed on MIT Technology Review's 10 Breakthrough Technologies of 2023. The list also includes the use of CRISPR to edit away people's problems with high cholesterol by rewriting a sliver of their DNA, artificial intelligence that makes artwork and NASA's James Webb Space Telescope, which is set to remodel our knowledge of the cosmos. The 22nd annual list features critical technological advances predicted to change how we live and work fundamentally. MIT Technology Review, owned by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, compiled the list of companies or institutions set to develop breakthroughs and when the public can expect these innovations. Mat Honan, editor-in-chief of MIT Technology Review, said: 'Our breakthrough technologies lists are fascinating snapshots of the evolution of big tech innovation breakthroughs.

You're reading the web edition of STAT Health Tech, our guide to how tech is transforming the life sciences. Sign up to get this newsletter delivered in your inbox every Tuesday and Thursday. During the pandemic, the FDA eased limitations on telehealth prescriptions and mail delivery for certain drugs -- including abortion pills, which can be used safely and effectively in the first 10 weeks of pregnancy. In December, the FDA made that access permanent -- but so far, telehealth startups aren't jumping to provide the pills. Companies including Hims & Hers, Nurx, Tia, and PillPack, many of which frame their offerings around reduced stigma and increased sexual freedom, have chosen not to offer the treatment, with some employees citing fear that political controversy could harm their businesses' growth.

I was alarmed to read this week that the Alabama Senate has passed a bill to outlaw abortion under almost all circumstances, including cases of rape and/or incest. Under the bill, doctors face 10 years in prison for attempting to terminate a pregnancy and 99 years for carrying out the procedure. Fortunately, for decades, women's reproductive rights groups, health providers, technologists, and hackers have been working together internationally to support a women's right to choose. They've created a legacy of work that may be able to help. The worst major city for abortion access is Rapid City, South Dakota, where women must travel 318 miles to get an abortion.

Two robots delivering abortion pills at a protest in Belfast have been confiscated by police. The robots were part of an initiative by the group Women on Waves, who claimed that the country's "mediaeval" anti-abortion laws were being broken because the so-called abortion robots were being operated from the Netherlands. "We try to find legal loopholes to draw attention to laws that violate women's rights," Rebecca Gomperts, a spokesperson for Women on Waves, told The Independent. "We've done it before with a ship and a drone to help women who cannot legally get an abortion in their country." One of the small remote controlled vehicles was seized by police before the protest, however a second was deployed after it was hidden by the protestors.