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FDA Wins Right To Regulate Adult Stem-Cell Treatments

Posted by samzenpus on from the big-brother-cells dept.

ananyo writes "A court decision on 23 July could help to tame the largely unregulated field of adult stem-cell treatments. The US District Court in Washington DC affirmed the right of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to regulate therapies made from a patient's own processed stem cells. The case hinged on whether the court agreed with the FDA that such stem cells are drugs. The judge concurred, upholding an injunction brought by the FDA against Regenerative Sciences, based in Broomfield, Colorado. The FDA had ordered Regenerative Sciences to stop offering 'Regenexx', its stem cell treatment for joint pain, in August 2010. As Slashdot has noted before, they are far from the only company offering unproven stem cell therapies."

3 of 216 comments (clear)

  1. Re:And not a thing will be done about it by Baloroth · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I think almost everyone is fine with government regulating dangerous unproven medical treatments with potentially horrific side-effects.

    --
    "None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
  2. Re:Everything by MozeeToby · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Injecting stem cells randomly into the body is probably not a good idea. Stem cells aren't magically fix everything machines. There's a significant risk of cancer if nothing else and I'd be shocked if there weren't other potential issues as well. Why do we have people running around defending hack doctor's rights to inject them on unsuspecting and uninformed patients? And don't say the patients are informed, the research on risks hasn't even been completed yet, how could they possibly be informed of risks that the administering doctor doesn't even know about?

    Lets go to an extreme, how would you feel about the FDA telling a doctor that they can't inject stomach acid into a person's blood stream? Other than the risks being more obvious, what's the difference?

  3. Re:And not a thing will be done about it by gmack · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Shouldn't be that bad? They are taking cells and injecting them where they don't naturally occur. That can have side effects such as cancer. I'm not saying it's not promising but there have been far too many wild claims about it and far too many clinics treating it as some magic cure without any regard for patient safety.