Dec. 12, 2006: China hope: medical

China Hope - the triumph of hope, to be exact - re: stem cell research and discovery - pace of clinical trials and lengthy experimentation , Thane Burnett, Dec. 12, 06

www.torontosun.com/News/Columnists/
Burnett_Thane/2006/12/10/2719798.html

[....] Most Canadian scientists, researchers and doctors defend the pace of clinical trials and lengthy experimentation, which is going on in labs and hospitals across the country — from stem cells culled from cadavers in Edmonton to amazing advances in repairing damaged lung tissue under way in Toronto and Montreal to a Calgary bioreactor which can grow human neural stem cells in the lab. If all this science is proven safe and effective, it’s only a matter of time before it’s available for everyone, they point out.

“When you get into these new areas of science … the respected norm is that people publish results in peer-reviewed journals,” Bernstein, a respected stem cell researcher, added.

‘People make claims’ [....]

How did interferon as a cancer treatment fare? I seem to remember reading of people with cancer going to Mexico for treatment. I think the group recently set up by the federal government to provide information on the latest and best available treatments (as an information clearing house, I believe) for the good of the country should be a step in the right direction. I would not go for a serious medical treatment in many places abroad, though the level of patient care on the personal level is often very high in that the nurses may be very sweet and seemingly caring. Their salaries are not high though, so there may be more per capita, or people don't go to hospital as readily if it is not called "free", or it may be that foreigners are accorded extra special treatment.