Socialized Medicine + Stem Cells = Success?

And now we watch conservatives and their media counterparts twitch and seeth with confusion.

BRITISH scientists have developed the world’s first stem cell therapy to cure the most common cause of blindness. Surgeons predict it will become a routine, one-hour procedure that will be generally available in six or seven years’ time.

The treatment involves replacing a layer of degenerated cells with new ones created from embryonic stem cells. It was pioneered by scientists and surgeons from the Institute of Ophthalmology at University College London and Moorfields eye hospital.

This week Pfizer, the world’s largest pharmaceutical research company, will announce its financial backing to bring the therapy to patients.

The treatment will tackle age-related macular degeneration (AMD), the most common cause of blindness. It affects more than 500,000 Britons and the number is forecast to increase significantly as people live longer. The disease involves the loss of eye cells.

Via The Times Online.

The only problem that I see with this procedure being done in America is that, if there is not sweeping changes done to our own healthcare system, it will be virtually unaffordable.

The Horror

I was thinking about Glenn Beck's doom-scenerio of scientist creating the "Master Race" now that Obama has lifted Bush's ban on stem-cell research when I came across this pic from Driftglass.

And why stop there?

Think about it, now every conservative Republican can have their own piece of Limbaugh-ass to kiss any time of day.

Science vs. Hocus Pocus

President Obama has signalled a major shift in how Washington will approach science.

In addition to ending a ban on stem cell research funding, President Barack Obama issued a potentially landmark memo Monday declaring a new era of "scientific integrity" across government.

In no uncertain terms, Obama signaled that the federal government would be guided by science, not the other way around. In offering a repudiation of the previous administration, he also promised a new era of transparency.

"Political officials should not suppress or alter scientific or technological findings and conclusions," Obama wrote in an official memorandum. "If scientific and technological information is developed and used by the federal government, it should ordinarily be made available to the public."

More from Wired.

After 8 years of the Bush adminstration essentially ignoring science - on multiple levels - it's more than just a refreshing change of pace, it should be applauded by everyone.

Considering the advancements in the medical field that seemed to not concern Bush at all, this will now be something that the lunatic-fringe Right will latch onto.

In fact, they already have. The Great Profit Of Doom, Glenn Beck:

So here you have Barack Obama going in and spending the money on embryonic stem cell research, and then some, fundamentally changing – remember, those great progressive doctors are the ones who brought us Eugenics. It was the progressive movement and it science. Let’s put science truly in her place. If evolution is right, why don’t we just help out evolution? That was the idea. And sane people agreed with it!

And it was from America. Progressive movement in America. Eugenics. In case you don’t know what Eugenics led us to: the Final Solution. A master race! A perfect person. …. The stuff that we are facing is absolutely frightening. So I guess I have to put my name on yes, I hope Barack Obama fails. But I just want his policies to fail; I want America to wake up.

HIV Cured?

A 42-year-old HIV patient with leukemia appears to have no detectable HIV in his blood and no symptoms after a stem cell transplant from a donor carrying a gene mutation that confers natural resistance to the virus that causes AIDS, according to a report published Wednesday in the New England Journal of Medicine.


The patient underwent a stem cell transplant and since, has not tested positive for HIV in his blood.

"The patient is fine," said Dr. Gero Hutter of Charite Universitatsmedizin Berlin in Germany. "Today, two years after his transplantation, he is still without any signs of HIV disease and without antiretroviral medication."

But there's a catch.

Still, this is promising.

Score for stem-cell usage.

Now, let' see the Right respond - if they do at all.