The Health Minister Speaks up against the Cord Blood Storage Hype
posted in - Nation, - Palmdoc |I am 100% with Dato’ Dr Chua Soi Lek who has rightly spoken up against the current Cord Blood Banking Hype. In Malaysia, the only active Cord Blood Banks are the private ones which provide the service to cryopreserve (freeze) your newborn’s Cord Blood stem cells for purported “insurance against future illnesses”.
“The ministry is concerned about the craze and increasing demand for cord blood storage. The misunderstanding among the public has become quite serious. If there is a potential (for its use), the ministry will study it.
“But right now there is no medical evidence on the use of the blood’s stem cells for treatment of diseases and conditions,” he said after chairing a meeting with representatives from 25 private Penang hospitals at Dorsett Hotel here yesterday.
Dr Chua said claims that it had the potential to treat heart diseases and control the ageing process were only “hype.”
What the unsuspecting public does not know is that Private Cord Blood Banking is not encouraged by any of the mainstream professional bodies. Here the Cord Blood is stored only for family members and the likelihood of it being used is extremely remote. What we encourage instead is the development of Public Cord Blood Banking and this is what the Minister failed to address. Public Cord Blood Banks would be an important source of stem cells for transplantation where an individual does not have a match. Cord Blood stored in a Public Cord Blood Bank would be available to anyone with a match who requires it. The chances of any Cord Blood stored being used in this way is much higher. So Dato’ Dr. Chua, while you’re right that there is too much hype about Private Cord Blood banks, I see too little hype and action taken to develop the local Public Cord Blood Bank.
Previous MMR posts on Cord Blood Banking:
Plea to women banking cord blood
Malaysian Public Cord Blood Bank
Warning over cord blood banking
Cord Stem Cell Banks : An investment for the future?
Cord Blood Banking II
Cord Blood Banking
Technorati Tags: Cord, Blood, Bank, Stem cells
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April 29th, 2007 at 10:00 pm
I am 200% on our health minister side. I always tell my patient that the private cord blood bank is on after their wallet. It is like staying in a condominium at 22nd floor and kept a boat just in case the flood ever happen at 22nd floor.
In the future stem cells may be growth from your own bone marrow and thus there may be no need to have this cord blood at all.
It is true that too little may be done to develope the piblic cord blood bank but some may be due to the attitude of the patients. See what happen to our organ donation program. I believe the government had done quite a bit for this. Not to mention the amnion donation program.