Chala
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Chala has not written any posts yet.
In this case I'm beyond sceptical. Stem cells are often given to medical tourists as the very words conjure up the idea of miracle cures in peoples minds, when there really is no evidence to think it will be of any clinical benefit (and in fact there is often evidence that it will be harmful).
If we were at the stage in medical science where we could cure chronic renal failure by using stem cells we would have done so in rats, or some other model animal, already - and we haven't yet to my knowledge.
It is likely that the theam that is going to administer the stem cells has no idea... (read more)
I'll attend, cool :)
The peanut is an interesting example. I think projects are underway to produce modified varieties that lack the allergens which people tend to react to.
Yeah but remember, there will always be a limit to the price they can charge for the GMO - and that will be determined by the cost of the wild type and the productivity different between the two. Thus Mosanto will only be able to sell it if it is worthwile for the farmers! Also, patents do expire eventually.
Lol, I'm still pretty sure it would be bad to put genes in to produce more of them though.
I am sorry but I have yet to hear of a GMO project that involved removing micronutrients! The only ones I've heard of have involved adding things, e.g. adding vitamin A to rice, adding virus compounds to potatos to act as a vaccine, adding resistance to parasites and viruses etc. Never, ever ever ever heard of a project to remove something.
Your final paragraph isn't really relevant, I mean look at golden rice for instance.
GMOs can be safe, they can be unsafe. For instance, if you inserted a gene into a potato to produce poisonous cyanide compounds that would be unsafe. Engineering a rice variety to produce Vitamin A precursors, however, is not likely to be unsafe on a basic scientific level and once the crop has been tested and retested for toxicity and other concerns it is simply not plausible that it would be dangerous.
Other intentions of GMOs can be, for instance, to produce an organism which is naturally resistant to pests or which is better able to grow in a variety of climates. With regards to pest resistance the toxicity of the compound... (read 390 more words →)
Um... what so you'd rather have diagnoses that are not based upon data? Or a diagnosis which is made up versus no diagnosis? I don't quite understand what you mean. Illnesses in the human body cannot be solved in the same way as an engineering problem, particularly at the margins. Most of the medical knowledge that could be derived without careful and large clinical trials is already known - I'm not sure what you expect a single doctor to do.
Furthermore, note that most patients will not die undiagnosed - bar situations, such as in geriatric patients, where many things are so suboptimal that you just can't sort out what is killing them... (read more)
It is likely going to be a net negative for society as I doubt that any information of value can be derived from this sort of experiment in humans. There is still a lot of animal research that has to be done before human trials can bring anything useful to the table. To my knowledge, chronic renal failure isn't even close to being treatable usign stem cells in rats or any other model animal.
It is likely that the team of "scientists" in this case are a bunch of phonies with know comprehension of the basic science behind stem cells, or any serious training in research.