What is the “proper” amount of freedom of choice for patients in medicine? What if the treatments in question are experimental and come with their own baggage of associated risks, personal costs, and potential costs to society? More broadly, do patients have a fundamental right to medical choice? These questions seem particularly appropriate today on […]
Do Patients Have a Fundamental Right to Choice? Read More »
Statins have been hailed as some of the best drugs ever. Given the massive, deadly prevalence of cardiovascular disease, some have even semi-jokingly talked about putting these drugs in the water supply for public health. The growing evidence (e.g. this story) that statins might significantly aid in prevention, delayed progression, or even post-treatment delay of
Statins dilemma: heart & cancer benefits, but diabetes risk Read More »
Later this May, I will attend and participate in Biotechnology and the Ethical Imagination (BEINGS 2015). This is an exciting and experimental summit that will focus on advances in cellular biotechnology – including both stem cell science and synthetic biology. The meeting is premised on the idea that the implications of increasing biotechnology power are
Biotechnology & the Ethical Imagination – A Preview of BEINGS summit Read More »
Last week was a big one for the life sciences in that we saw the milestone of the first ever published paper reporting human embryo genetic modification (see here and here). It was one of those situations where we knew it was coming, but it was still a jolt. Not surprisingly this event sparked intense discussion
4 areas of debate on 1st human embryo genetic modification paper Read More »
The paper that came out Wednesday from a research group in China reporting the first genetic modification of human embryos has sparked a lot of discussion. Some concerns about this paper have surfaced. 2-day review? The paper (HT to John Borghi) was in review only from March 30-April 1 — so at most 48 hours. Really? That certainly
Concerns surface on Chinese paper on genetic modification of human embryos Read More »
Rumors have been flying for months that researchers in China and possibly elsewhere were shopping papers around at high-profile journals that reported gene editing and genetic modification of human embryos. Update: apparently this paper (HT to @JohnBorghi) was only reviewed for 2 days (see image at bottom of post), raising major concerns about the depth of
Researchers in China make genetically modified human embryos Read More »
Controversial TV physician Dr. Mehmet Oz hasn’t had a great year what with his disastrous testimony before Congress. (2020 Update; Dr. Oz recently had a good show on stem cell clinics so that’s something. I discussed issues with his staff prior to the show.) Now Dr. Oz has been slammed by a group doctors from
Doctors call for Dr. Oz to be booted from Columbia Read More »
I’m doing a series of interviews with leaders in the field on human germline modification with the first interview in this series with George Church and today’s second in this series is a conversation I had with Dr. Jennifer Doudna, a pioneer in CRISPR-Cas9 technology. Doudna is a Professor in MCB and Chemistry as well
Jennifer Doudna Interview on CRISPR, Human Gene Editing Read More »
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how the future of human reproduction might be very different from today’s reality due to recent technological advances including cloning. Things like human cloning (the reproductive, “Star Wars” kind) and human genetic modification seem very real now. It feels almost imminent in a sense compared to the milleenia
Daisuke Takakura 高倉 大輔 Powerfully Captures Cloning Read More »
The big stem cell news already this week is the acquisition by Fujifilm of Cellular Dynamics International (CDI) for a whopping $307 million dollars or about $16.50 per CDI share. You can read the press release here. Update: The entity is now known as Fujifilm Cellular Dynamics. It was less than two years ago that CDI did
Was Fujifilm CDI acquisition a good move by the companies? Read More »