Biomedical Regulations & Ethics
Genetic solutions depends largely on data from people of European descent. Do we need to address that research imbalance?
To boost the participation of marginalized communities in genetic studies, doctors must first win back their trust ...
Controversial new drug meant to increase sexual desire in women is approved for sale
The Food and Drug Administration approved a controversial drug meant to increase women’s desire for sex, a treatment that has ...
Growing criticism over stratospheric cost of spinal muscular atrophy-fighting drug Zolgensma ignores trade-off value
Novartis recently won FDA approval for Zolgensma, a new medicine that can potentially cure infants suffering from the otherwise fatal ...
Scammers set sights on booming genetic testing market
The cost of genetic testing for disease assessment can be as high as $10,000. With that kind of money in ...
Biohacker Josiah Zayner meets with California regulators investigating him: ‘It was surreal’
A few weeks ago, the prominent biohacker Josiah Zayner took to Instagram to break some news: He had received a ...
Viewpoint: We don’t need another study to convince us that gene-edited babies are a bad idea
He [Jiankui] attempted to disable a gene called CCR5 by producing a variant that has been shown to confer resistance ...
Viewpoint: US government’s clinical trial registry plagued by ‘bogus’ patient-funded stem-cell trials
When a judge ruled [June 3] that the FDA could stop the work of U.S. Stem Cell, the firm’s trials ...
Viewpoint: Neuroscientists cannot afford to ignore differences between male, female brains
Diseases like Alzheimer’s and schizophrenia manifest differently in men and women, and that’s important to know ...
Consumer genetic testing and how to protect your DNA data
Consumer DNA testing kits like those from 23andMe, Ancestry.com and MyHeritage promise a road map to your genealogy and, in ...
Legalizing pot won’t slow the opioid epidemic, study suggests
Nearly five years ago, a team of researchers performing a study on medical cannabis came to a startling conclusion: The ...
Fecal transplant death sparks new FDA screening precautions, pause of clinical trials
One patient has died and another became seriously ill after fecal transplants inadvertently seeded their innards with a multi-drug resistant ...
Viewpoint: FDA must do more to protect consumers from ‘outright fraud’ of dietary supplements
Dietary supplements are often ineffective, if not dangerous. What does the path to supplement legislation and regulation look like? ...
Viewpoint: Congressional proposal to loosen court ruling that blocked companies from patenting genes could ‘stifle’ science innovation
In 2013, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of innovation when it struck down a patent that gave one ...
New migraine treatments a game changer for some patients
Chronic migraine disorder, which a neurologist diagnosed [Michelle] Tracy with shortly after her initial ER visit, is defined as having ...
Why an FDA legal victory won’t stop controversial stem cell clinics
When the Food and Drug Administration won a landmark lawsuit [June 3] against a stem cell company, health officials hailed ...
How the rush to decriminalize magic mushrooms could hurt psychedelic drug research
Welcome to a murky new front in the war to bring psychedelics out of the shadows and into both legal ...
Restorative stem cell treatments? William Shatner pitching stem cell therapies’ that evidence shows don’t work
Shatner has not been known, especially on Twitter, for his reflective nature or critical thinking abilities. ... Star Trek star ...
Viewpoint: Working with drug companies to help terminally ill patients gain access to experimental drugs
My colleagues and I at New York University’s Division of Medical Ethics quickly recognized that right to try could not ...
Congress considers allowing gene patents to keep pace with Chinese innovations
In 2013, the Supreme Court unanimously struck down patents on two human genes—BRCA1 and BRCA2—associated with breast and ovarian cancers ...
Making a case against ‘aggressive’ restrictions on opioid prescriptions
[Stefan] Kertesz, a primary care physician who also specializes in addiction medicine, had not spent his career investigating long-term opioid ...
Do China’s controversial CRISPR babies illustrate the need for an ‘undo button’?
Will CRISPR-in-the-clinic come with a fail-safe mechanism? ...
Viewpoint: Guardian (UK) ‘Toxic America’ series: Anti-chemical activism masquerades as science journalism
So far, they’ve published no article by or in-depth interview with an actual scientist ...
Viewpoint: Trump’s fetal-tissue research ban ‘ignores and defies the facts’
The Trump administration is halting fetal tissue research by government scientists and placing new restrictions on how the National Institutes ...
Viewpoint: ‘Race realists’ distort science to promote controversial political views
Far-right and anti-immigrant groups have once more become visible and powerful across Europe and the US. … I have spent ...
Ethical ‘quagmire’: How one ALS patient got in line for a therapy never tested in humans
The FDA gave Jaci Hermstad, a 25-year old Iowan who is dying from a rare form of ALS, an early ...
Body part regeneration: How science can make the jump from fantasy to reality
Could studying animals that regenerate body parts help us understand how to regrow human organs and limbs? It's unlikely in ...
Trump administration halts US funding for fetal tissue research, threatening work on AIDS, cancer and other diseases
The Trump administration on Wednesday [June 5] ended funding of medical research by government scientists using fetal tissue and canceled ...
Terminally ill California man is first to undergo cryonic preservation after assisted death
A terminally ill patient who opted for assisted death has undergone cryonic preservation at the Alcor Life Extension Foundation. This ...
