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FDA Regulating Your Stem Cells As Interstate Commerce

Posted by timothy on from the oh-that's-raich dept.

New submitter dcbrianw writes "A non-surgical procedure that treats joint pain involves removing stem cells from a patient's blood and reinserting them into the joint. The facility conducting these procedures resides in Colorado, but because it orders equipment to perform the procedure from outside of Colorado, the FDA claims it must regulate this process and that it can classify stem cells as a drug. This issue opens the debate of what the FDA, or other regulatory bodies, may regulate within each of our own bodies." Quick: Name five activities with no possible plausible effect on interstate commerce.

6 of 332 comments (clear)

  1. DMT by Hatta · · Score: 5, Informative

    Dimethyltryptamine (DMT) is a naturally occuring endogenous neurotransmitter that is also a Schedule I drug.

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    Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
  2. Growing your own food affects interstate commerce by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    If you grow your own food, you won't buy it from another state. Therefore, growing your own food affects interstate commerce. At least that's what the Supreme Court decided when a farmer fed his own animals with his home grown food.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wickard_v._Filburn

  3. Re:So? by ClioCJS · · Score: 5, Informative
    Uh, no. That's not how medicine OR the FDA works. They don't regulate medical procedures throughout the country. They have a specific scope. But i guess you weren't too sure of yourself if you had to post anonymously, were you?

    A modicum of facts

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    -Clio
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  4. Re:Commerce maximalists? by robbadler · · Score: 5, Informative

    I think you misread the article. Biohazardous material will not be crossing state lines, medical equipment will. This is an attempt to stop the use of that equipment on the grounds that it at one point crossed a state line. So did my jeans. Can they use Interstate Commerce to keep me from going to work?

  5. Re:Commerce maximalists? by Goobermunch · · Score: 5, Informative

    Please, please, please. Learn your history.

    FDR did not pack the court with statists. In fact, the proposal he had advanced (of adding more justices to the supreme court), never went through. Instead, one justice on the court changed his mind about how to approach these matters and turned what had once been a 4-5 court into a 5-4 court. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_switch_in_time_that_saved_nine

    But go ahead and blame FDR, that's easier than learning about history.

    --AC

  6. Re:Commerce maximalists? by evil_aaronm · · Score: 5, Informative

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wickard_v._Filburn