A liquid nitrogen bank containing a suspension of stem cells. (Photo: Elena Pavlovich, via Shutterstock)OPINION: The Golden State boasts the 5th largest economy, the biggest and best public university systems and, thanks to support from California voters, it’s the global epicenter for advancing stem cell research and treatments for chronic diseases and conditions that will afflict nearly all California families.
Robert Klein, left, and CIRM board member Jeff Sheey, right. At center is Board Vice Chair Art Torres. (Photo: California Stem Cell Report)The two men once worked together over the last 16 years to spend $3 billion in state funds on stem cell research in California. This week, however, they were very publicly on opposite sides of a ballot initiative to spend $5.5 billion more. The initiative is Proposition 14, which would require the state to borrow the additional billions.
Personnel at UCSF's facility in Fresno, which may benefit if Proposition 14 is approved. (Photo: UCSF)Proposition 14, the fall ballot measure to save California’s stem cell agency from financial extinction, contains much, much more than the $5.5 billion that it is seeking from the state’s voters. Added to the agency’s charter would be research involving mental health, “therapy delivery,” personalized medicine and “aging as a pathology.“ That is not to mention a greater emphasis on supporting “vital research opportunities” that are not stem cell-related.
Rudy Giuliani, left, and Robert Hariri. (Photo: Hariri Twitter page.)California’s stem cell agency last week awarded $750,000 to a New Jersey firm to help finance a clinical trial for the firm’s proposed Covid-19 treatment — a therapy that has been hailed by President Trump’s personal attorney as having “real potential.” The firm is Celularity, Inc. Its president and co-founder is Robert Hariri, who describes himself as a longtime friend of Rudy Giuliani.
A cancer stem cell researcher in the laboratory. (Photo: science photo, via Shutterstock)A $5.5 billion stem cell bond measure qualified this afternoon for the November ballot, but the campaign to win voter approval is facing an array of hurdles that its supporters never envisioned last summer when they were formulating the initiative.
Signature gathering during the 2018 election cycle. (Photo: Michael Gordon, via Shutterstock)The $5.5 billion California stem cell initiative is virtually certain to qualify for the fall ballot as the arithmetic of the signature count begins to fall into place. The measure needs only slightly more than the 67 percent of the signatures that remain to be verified as coming from registered voters. The qualification percentage of raw signatures so far is 78 percent.
A photo illustration of the coronavirus pandemic and California. (Photo: bekulnis, via Shutterstock)The state of California and its top medical regulator remain mired in a go-slow posture on the regulation of “snake oil” stem cell clinics that are currently riding the COVID-19 crisis to peddle dubious treatments to desperate patients. The marketing surge by the clinics has drawn increased attention nationally, including in prestigious scientific journals such as Cell Stem Cell whose usual fare deals with such things as “Stem Cell Hierarchy in Colorectal Cancer.”
A laboratory researcher examines cancer stem cells. (Image: science photo, via Shutterstock)Backers of a $5.5 billion stem cell research proposal in California today have once again missed a self-imposed, but critical deadline as they continue to struggle with securing enough signatures to place the measure on the November ballot.
Signature gathering in Ventura County during the 2018 election cycle. (Photo: Michael Gordon, via Shutterstock)The current coronavirus emergency and the practice of social distancing are likely to put a crimp in gathering signatures to qualify a $5.5 billion stem cell initiative for the November ballot in California.
A clinical researcher with a multi-pipette arrangement of cancer stem cells. (Photo: Science Photo, via Shutterstock)One of the nation’s leading regenerative medicine industry groups is touting multi-billion dollar savings that may be achieved with the type of stem cell and gene therapies that are being developed with cash from California’s financially beleaguered stem cell program.