[epistasis]

> but only the biopsy needs to be weighed against risk, not the scan.

You're setting an arbitrary boundary because you don't want to consider the downsides. If you set the same boundary on the benefits of the MRI, then you wouldn't be able to include treatment of cancer as part of the upside to doing an MRI scan.

Doctors are far wiser about these things than HN commenters that have never dealt with the complex tradeoffs of dealing not only with populations of people, but also with dealing with the psychology of humans beyond people that prioritize rationality over everything else.

Doctors are responsible for treating all of humanity, not just the subset that behave the way we want them to.

[Brakenshire]

People can (and did) make the same case against the thermometer.