NHS To Give Volunteers "Synthetic Blood" Made In a Laboratory Within Two Years

schwit1 writes: The NHS plans to test artificial blood made from human stem cells in patients and hopes to start transfusing people with artificial blood by 2017. The trials will take place in Cambridge and If successful could lead to the mass production of artificial blood. The Independent reports: "A long-awaited clinical trial of artificial red blood cells will occur before 2017, NHS scientists said. The blood is made from stem cells extracted from either the umbilical cord blood of newborn babies or the blood of adult donors. The trial, thought to be a world first, will involve small transfusions of a few teaspoons of synthetic blood to test for any adverse reactions. It will allow scientists to study the time the manufactured red blood cells can survive within human recipients. Eventually, it is hoped that the NHS will be able to make unlimited quantities of red blood cells for emergency transfusions."

Comments

Shades of Methuselah's Children

[CrimsonAvenger]

Shame it won't work the way it did in that story.

Still, a major step, especially for the rarer bloodtypes. Be nice to not have to depend so much on donors, especially since donors are way more likely to have loathsome diseases transmitted via blood than any lab-grown blood....