Showing posts with label media. Show all posts
Showing posts with label media. Show all posts

Monday, November 16, 2020

California's $5.5 Billion Stem Cell Boost: The Journal Nature Reports on "Split" Views, Conflicts and Priorities

The internationally respected journal Nature today took a look at the $5.5 billion refinancing of California's stem cell research program in an article that is not likely to please its supporters. The headline on the piece said:

"California's vote to revive controversial stem-cell institute sparks debate

"The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine will receive billions in state funding — but some scientists oppose the plan."

The first paragraph of the article said, "(S)cientists are split over whether the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) in Oakland is a worthwhile investment for the US state — or for the field of stem-cell research."

In significant ways, the article by senior reporter Nidhi Subbaraman echoed important elements of an examination of CIRM that Nature published in 2008. The journal, in fact, warned at the time of "cronyism" at the agency. (See Nature's editorial here and the article by Erika Check Hayden here.)

Today's latest article in Nature said,

"(C)ritics of CIRM are concerned about oversight at the state agency, which has faced complaints about potential conflicts of interest among its board members for years. They also point out that the field has grown and now receives federal support, making state funding hard to justify — especially amid a pandemic that has imperiled California’s economy."
Comments about priorities and the failure of the $5.5 billion measure (Proposition 14) to correct governance flaws at CIRM were also carried by Nature. Subbaraman wrote,
"'Unfortunately, Proposition 14 sets a bad example for the use of public money for the advancement of science,' says Zach Hall, a neurobiologist who led CIRM as its first president between 2005 and 2007."

Nature continued,

"'You could argue that California would do better, economically and scientifically, to have a CRISPR institute,' Hall says, arguing that the revolutionary precision gene-editing tool is better placed to benefit from such a huge infusion of cash."

 Subbaraman quoted another former top level scientist at CIRM.

"'As scientists, everybody always welcomes additional funding,' says Arlene Chiu, former director of scientific activities at CIRM. 'But as a Californian, one wonders if there are better ways to do this.'"

Nature mentioned a $700,000 study of the agency by the Institute of Medicine in 2012, which recommended a major restructuring of CIRM along with steps to deal with its conflicts of interest, which the IOM regarded as a serious problem. 

The California Stem Cell Report, which has followed the agency since 2005, has analyzed CIRM's awards and reported earlier this year that 79 percent ($2.1 billion) has gone to institutions with links to members of CIRM's governing board. Members of the board cannot vote on grants to their institutions, but they control the direction of the agency and approve plans for all award rounds.

Most of the recommendations by the IOM were not implemented by CIRM or Proposition 14. Nature interviewed one of the members, Cato Laurencin, of the IOM panel that spent months examining CIRM, which financed the study.

Subbaraman wrote,

"'It is very exciting that Prop. 14 passed and that CIRM will continue its funding,' says Cato Laurencin, a biomedical engineer at the University of Connecticut in Farmington, who is not funded by the institute. 'This field is at a bit of an inflection point in terms of our understanding of stem-cell science.'"

Subbaraman's piece included comments from Robert Klein, the real estate developer who sponsored Proposition 14 and poured millions into the campaign for it. Klein was also responsible for writing the 17,000-word measure.

The Nature article said,

"Responding to the criticisms, Klein says he crafted the proposal with the guidance of multiple groups of experts, and kept the mandate deliberately broad to allow for flexibility as the field grows. 'There's an intent here,' he says, 'to have the agency be responsive to the development of science.'"

Tuesday, October 13, 2020

'Hobby Horse' to 'Stunning Progress:' Two Newspapers Look at California Stem Cell Program and the $5.5 Billion Prop. 14

Does California's stem cell research program, now facing a $5.5 billion referendum, represent one person's "personal hobby horse" or does it represent "stunning progress" in developing therapies and cures?

Those are two questions embodied in two articles in major Californa newspapers this week about Proposition 14. The ballot initiative would provide the billions for the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM), as the state stem cell agency is officially known. 

CIRM is running out of money and will begin closing its doors this winter unless Proposition 14 is approved. In addition to the $5.5 billion, the measure sets a new and expanded course for the agency, which has yet to help finance a stem cell therapy that is widely available to the public after working on the matter for nearly 16 years. 

Lisa Krieger, writing in what the San Jose Mercury News called an "analysis," related a number of  CIRM achievements, ranging from providing more than $200 million in "elegant buildings" to familiar anecdotes about patients who have been helped in clinical trials at least partially supported by CIRM. 

She said, 

“'CIRM has supported some really superb research and researchers and built a powerful infrastructure,' said Robert Cook-Deegan of the School for the Future of Innovation in Society at Arizona State University. 'In a field where there aren’t as many other sources of funding, that’s almost certainly, in the long run, a good thing.'"

"This is stunning progress..." Krieger wrote. "Still, it falls far short of Proposition 71’s breathless rhetoric from the 2004 campaign."

In the Los Angeles Times, Michael Hiltzik, a business columnist and author of "Big Science," said Proposition 14 "is a perfect example of the drawbacks of allowing a public program to turn into one individual’s personal hobby horse."

Hiltzik said, 

"In this case, the individual is Robert Klein II, a Northern California real estate developer who drafted and promoted Proposition 71 of 2004, the $3-billion initiative that created the program formally known as the California Institute of Regenerative Medicine, or CIRM, and who led the program as chairman during its formative years. Klein has contributed more than $6.6 million to the initiative campaign.

"CIRM has funded much worthy scientific research. But it has struggled since its creation with the outsized expectations that Klein’s advertising campaign for Proposition 71 engendered — namely, that the program would yield 'cures' for conditions including Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and diabetes."

Hiltzik's comments were part of a longer roundup of his thoughts on the ballot propositions that face California voters this month. He said he would vote with "regret" against the measure and referenced a longer piece that he wrote last December dissecting Klein's ballot measure and the issues have troubled CIRM.

In it, he said that Proposition 14 "perpetuates many of the original measure’s flaws and makes some of them worse. 

"That’s dangerous, because although the measure could fuel the stem cell program for years to come, it might also prompt a repudiation by voters sensitive to its many imperfections. Such an outcome would be tragic for California and the advanced science already supported by CIRM." 

The Los Angeles Times claims about 1.3 million readers daily. The San Jose Mercury is part of a newspaper chain that circulates its articles widely in the San Francisco Bay area.

Krieger and Hiltzik both were around for the 2004 ballot campaign that created CIRM in 2004 through Proposition 71, another ballot measure crafted by Klein. It ran only 10,000 words. Proposition 14 contains about 17,000 words.

I should note that Proposition 14 is technically not a ballot referendum but a ballot initiative. However, the measure effectively serves as a referendum on CIRM's past and likely future performance.

*****

To read more on CIRM, its performance and Proposition 14, see David Jensen's news book: California's Great Stem Cell Experiment: Inside a $3 Billion Search for Stem Cell Cures. Click here for more information on the author.

Thursday, May 30, 2019

Faustian Bargains and Biotech Millions: A Fresh California Yarn

It is a California tale: The search for millions in cash to research and develop cures for terrible afflictions that destroy people's lives. 

But it is not centered in an office building in downtown Oakland, with great views of San Francisco Bay and overlooking Lake Merritt. 

The official plot summary goes like this:
"Desperate to secure funding for her med tech startup, an idealistic scientist and her husband strike an outrageous deal with a mysterious investor."
"There’s a new Netflix series involving biotech, venture capital, and Faustian bargaining. It's called 'What/If' and it’s about the founder of Emigen Molecular Sequencing who, despite her scientific acumen and noble goal of saving cancer patients, cannot seem to convince Silicon Valley’s ocean of vest-clad VCs to invest in her genomics company. ('I’m afraid Big Pharma would drown us in litigation,' says one, inexplicably.)
"That’s when she meets the all-powerful investor Anne Montgomery, played by RenĂ©e Zellweger, who seems to be splitting the difference between 'Basic Instinct' and 'Devil’s Advocate.' Montgomery offers her the money she needs to keep Emigen afloat, but the deal has dark implications for her earnest and unfortunately sideburned husband, who is a pro baseball player-turned-EMT with a night job as a bartender.
"Anyway, by the end of the pilot, there’s an embattled startup, a fractured marriage, and an unsolved assault. Your correspondent (Damian Garde) did not make it to episode two."
As for that Oakland enterprise mentioned earlier, it is the $3 billion California stem cell agency, which is running out of cash and looking for $5 billion more.  

Thursday, October 05, 2017

Forty-three Percent Jump in Interest in California Stem Cell Internet Information


Interest in California stem cell matters spiked in mid-week but still is well below the interest in broader matters, such as stem cell therapies, according to Google search data this morning.

Searches using the term "California stem cells" shot up 43 percent in midweek, Google reported. Just exactly why more people were searching on the term is not clear, but the Google data shows a definite high point.

The scale of 1 to 100 on the charts with this item reflects the level of interest -- not numbers of readers or page views. One-hundred shows the peak interest level only.  Actual numbers were not disclosed by Google.

Readers can see the trends in the two Google-generated charts attached to this item, which have an important caveat. The charts are live and updated automatically by Google as long as they are posted.

My take on the information is that at this point it is more of a curiosity than of any major signficance. However, in the event of major stem cell news, the data might have more value.

Sunday, February 08, 2015

Crossing the One-Million Mark: A Decade's Worth of Stem Cell Readership

Google message on page views from last Friday.
The California Stem Cell Report last week chalked up its one millionth page view, a large and fancy readership score that came after more than 10 years of writing about the Golden State’s $3 billion stem cell research program.

Google reported the seven-digit figure at 10:50 a.m. PST on Friday.  No bells rang, however, and no whistles sounded. The tumbler on “dashboard” of the blog just simply and silently clicked over from 999,999.

For those not familiar with Internet terms, a page view is recorded by Google each time a person opens his or her Internet browser on a particular page. It is an industry standard that it is used to help define readership, something akin to circulation numbers for newspaper.

The one-million figure is both large and small. It is tiny in comparison to most general news sites, which may gather millions of page views in a week. It is large in comparison to the potential audience. This writer estimates that no more than 3,000 or 4,000 persons worldwide are deeply interested in stem cells. Considerably fewer are deeply interested in the affairs of the California stem cell agency.

There is also the “so what” question that comes up when evaluating readership. Have any of the more than 4,000 items published since January 2005 had a significant impact? That is always hard to judge, but bumps in readership tend to indicate that certain themes are resonating.  The scope of the audience also indicates that many individuals find frequent value in what is carried here. 

Regular readers of the California Stem Cell Report range from the general public to the folks at the National Institutes of Health. Readers check in from Harvard, UC San Francisco, Stanford, UCLA, UC San Diego, France, Germany, Russia, the United Kingdom and many other locations. Occasionally, a member of the stem cell agency governing board will comment favorably and privately about the value of the blog. Journalists read it, using it as a springboard for their own stories.

The article with the highest views by far deals with the potential cost of stem cell therapies and discussed a report from Japan that contained the figure $512,000.  Earlier today, the item recorded 10,303 page views since it was published less than two years ago. Also today, the article ranked No. 6 out of 2.5 million results in a Google search using the term “stem cell therapy cost.” The piece seems to have attracted a great deal of interest from the public with many onetime hits, probably coming from people who are considering such a treatment.

The second most read item on the California Stem Cell Report is a 2009 item headlined, “Controller Calls for Online Posting of Financial Holdings of CIRM Officials.” It had 2,748 page views. Third is a “pay-for-eggs” item from 2013 that hit 2,487.  That piece involved a commentary in Forbes, which undoubtedly generated abnormally high traffic for the subject.

Our continuing intent has been to delve deeply into a single subject, the California stem cell agency. It is an important experiment in stem cell research funding. Its work has already had a major impact on the field in California. The agency’s success or failure could have major implications for the field and is worthy of considerable attention.

The California Stem Cell Report brings an independent focus to information about the agency. The Report is the only news site devoted exclusively to coverage of the agency and related matters, including analysis and commentary.  The blog provides on-the-scene coverage of the agency's most important public events, either via the Internet or from the sites of the sessions. The blog also explores in more depth California stem cell issues ignored by both the scientific press and the mainstream media. It provides information that can be nowhere else. 

The Internet is well-designed for such a relatively narrowly focused effort as opposed to the mainstream media, which must pursue mass audiences.  Blogs are especially useful in dealing with narrow subjects because of their relatively low production costs, timeliness and lack of space limitations. Newspapers and other mass media, on the other hand, have high costs and extraordinary space limitations as to do all print products. Timeliness can also be issue with some Web sites associated with print.

As for our costs, this blog is produced by one person, David Jensen (yours truly). He is a retired journalist who finances it personally and who has no financial ties to biotech academia or industry,
or the agency. Google does place ads on the site, which generate about $150 every six months or so based on the number of people who click on an ad.

But beginning today this blog is boosting its efforts to cover the costs of the California Stem Cell Report and adding a way to contribute directly to the effort. On this page, you can find a PayPal “donate” button in upper left hand corner. Donate today. It is a way to help keep independent, California stem cell news flowing vigorously. As the California stem cell agency noted last week, “Money matters.”

And thanks to all who are moved to contribute.

Tuesday, January 14, 2014

Nine Years on the California Stem Trail: A Look Behind the Curtain

Back in November 2004, the re-election of President George Bush dominated the news throughout the nation. But out in California, there was talk of a new gold rush, triggered by a measure buried deep on the ballot that month.

The latter-day argonauts were not expected, however, to be scratching out nuggets. Instead they would be fiddling with stem cells, particularly human embryonic stem cells. It all looked like big bucks for the biotech industry -- $3 billion from a new state agency.

That was when the idea for this blog began to percolate. A few weeks later -- nine years ago this month  -- the first item appeared on the California Stem Cell Report. It now seems a likely occasion to reflect on the scope and purpose of what appears here and to discuss readership and other matters.

David Jensen
Editor California Stem Cell Report
First, to answer an oft-heard question: Why am I am writing about this particular agency, formally known as the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine(CIRM)? The simple answer is that it is interesting, at least to some, and important. The agency – created by Proposition 71 of 2004 – is an exceptional and unprecedented state effort. Nothing like it has existed in
California history. It operates with unusual autonomy. The governor and the legislature cannot touch its funding or direct its research. It survives on $3 billion borrowed by the state, which will roughly double the cost of the research to $6 billion or so because of the interest on the borrowing. It also marks another first with its use of California state debt to pay for scientific research.

At one point, CIRM was the world's largest single source of funding for human embryonic stem cell research. The agency has lured top researchers from other states and countries. And it represents a unique mash-up of government, politics, big business, big science, big academia, morality, ethics, life and death and even sex.

Since 2005, the California Stem Cell Report has been read by researchers, policy makers and other interested parties around the world. They log in from Singapore and Great Britain, Canada and Korea as well as institutions ranging from the NIH and Harvard to Stanford, UC San Francisco, Scripps and Sanford Burnham and more.

I estimate that only a few thousand persons around the world are deeply interested on a regular basis in stem cell research, making the potential audience for this Web site rather small. But Google reports that as of today 729,841 page views have been registered during the life of the blog. (I have posted 3,608 items.) Last month, which was slow because of the holiday, the California Stem Cell Report chalked up 16,878 page views, which are the basic Internet standard for measuring readership.

The items that seem to grab the most attention involve individuals as opposed to the nuts and bolts of either science or policy. When CIRM directors considered election of a new chairman in 2011, readership jumped. Machinations involving selection of new presidents at the agency draw readers. Of course, reports about dubious activities or problems also are of significant interest. The lure of stories about people nonetheless is not much different than seen in the mainstream media, based on my 35 or so years in the news business.

Another matter that has drawn an extraordinary amount of interest involves money: specifically the expected cost of stem cell therapies. In 2010, I posted on Scribd a study financed by CIRM -- one that the agency was not trumpeting -- that examined the issue of costs. Since then, it has been read 14,096 times, the most of any document that I have posted on the Scribd service, which provides a way to mount documents and link to them via the blog.

In its initial years, the blog primarily surveyed California media reporting on the stem cell agency, providing links and commentary with some original reporting. But today the focus is mostly on original reporting with analysis and commentary. The agency and its doings have slipped off the radar of the mainstream media, where they probably will remain short of a major scandal or a massive PR effort by the agency.

One of my goals was to provide detailed information, news and analysis about California's unusual research effort – far more than could be done by print media. The idea was to exploit one of the unique characteristics of the Internet-- the capability of publishing nearly unlimited amounts of information. Newspapers constantly cut, squeeze and trim stories because of both cost and their desire to publish a large number of articles about many different subjects. With the Internet, there is virtually no limit on the amount of content, a feature that is both good and not-so-good. Another goal was to go beyond the official handouts and to provide a guide to where useful information can be found.

The California Stem Cell Report differs from the mainstream media in another regard. The blog carries the remarks of representatives of the agency and other interested parties VERBATIM, even when they sometimes involve harsh attacks on the conduct of the blog. Major media almost never allow such access.

I have a couple of biases that underpin what I do. One is the assumption that it is beneficial generally for the government to fund scientific research. The other and more important principle is that government agencies should operate with maximum openness and transparency and that their first obligation is to the people – not the researchers that they fund or the institutions that have something at stake.

While readers can judge for themselves the success of the blog, the scope of the readership from the NIH to California's biotech hot spots suggests it is well-received. Mainstream media reporters as well as science writers often use the California Stem Cell Report as a reference and starting point. The blog has also served as a springboard for acceptance of my own occasional freelance articles in such places as The Sacramento Bee and Wired News. And in 2012, I testified before the Institute of Medicine, at its invitation, during preparation of its $700,000 report on the stem cell agency.

As for how the work is done, the writing and reporting are performed largely from a sailboat in Mexico and Central America, on which my wife and I live full-time. Sometimes that has presented difficulties, but as cellphone and Internet service has improved over the years, the task has become easier. We make visits back to California regularly during which I meet with agency officials and others and attend CIRM's public meetings.

I have focused largely on the policy and business aspects of the agency because that is where my knowledge and background lies. During my career, I have covered and edited stories from the state Capitol for United Press International and spent 10 years as the business editor of The Sacramento Bee along with editing prize-winning investigative projects, including the 1992 Pulitzer Prize-winning series, “The Monkey Wars,” by Deborah Blum, who now teaches at the University of Wisconsin. I also served two years and one week with Jerry Brown during his 1974 campaign for governor and into his first term.

As for my financial interests, my wife and I have never had any investments in any enterprise that could benefit financially from the activities of the stem cell agency except for possibly through index-based mutual funds over which I have no control. But like most of world, my family has suffered from conditions that theoretically could benefit from development of stem cell therapies. 

I am always interested in thoughts and comments from readers, critical or otherwise. My skin is reasonably thick. I have always told reporters who have worked for me that if you perform your act in a public place you should be prepared for any sort of reaction. I welcome suggestions for stories and improvements.

Feel free to contact me at djensen@californiastemcell.com. Or if you prefer to withhold your identity, you can leave a comment anonymously via the “comment” function at the end of each item.  

Tuesday, April 10, 2007

Live Internet Broadcast of CIRM IP Legislation

One advantage that the Big Tomato, as Sacramento is sometimes known, has over other cities in California is that seems a little better wired in terms of bringing state government information to users of the Internet.

For example, you can hear remarks by California stem cell Chairman Robert Klein to the Sacramento Press Club on Monday on the Press Club's web site. A video is promised as well on the CalChannel website.

For your planning purposes, Wednesday's hearing of the Senate Health Committee on SB771 will be broadcast live on CalChannel. If you want to view it, you might tune in early to one of the other broadcasts to be sure your computer is properly configured for playing the live video.

Thursday, April 05, 2007

Criticism: The Price for a CIRM Grant

The California stem cell agency is breaking into some of the cloistered halls of science with criticism that publicly labels one scientist "naĂ¯ve" and calls another scientist's proposal potentially irrelevant.

Of course, the sting of the criticism is soothed with the balm of multimillion dollar research grants.

Reporter Carl Hall of the San Francisco Chronicle recently sliced a bit deeper than other reporters into the public summaries of the grants won by California scientists, noting that they "offer a rare glimpse into the traditionally cloistered world of scientific peer review. He quoted Arlene Chiu, director of scientific programs at CIRM, as saying,
"The NIH doesn't show any of this kind of thing going on, This is the first time you can see how people criticize one another."
Arnold Kriegstein, chief of the UC San Francisco stem cell program, was the target of a comment that he was "naĂ¯ve" on some technical matters. He told Hall he was a victim of his own brevity and may have been misunderstood "in certain technical aspects." His bruises were nicely tended with a $2.5 million grant.

Alice Tarantal, a pediatrics professor at UC Davis, described the review as a "very fair process" although some reviewers questioned how relevant her model was from a clinical perspective. She received a $2.3 million grant.

The names of those criticized are only publicly released after the grants are approved, although some persons very familiar with stem cell research could identify at least some of the scientists in advance based on the nature of their work. The names of those who fail to win grants are not released.

We have written often about unwarranted secrecy in the grant process. But the public summaries are an excellent step in the right direction and CIRM should receive ample credit for providing them.

Hall should also receive credit for bringing them to a higher level of public visibility.

In another grant-related story, reporter Terri Somers of the San Diego Union-Tribune looked more closely at some of the recipients of CIRM grants, including those relatively new to the field. She described how their research is cutting across specialities with the hope of transforming the field.

One example is a $638,000 grant to UC San Diego professor Shu Chien, a medical doctor and pioneer in bioengineering. Somers wrote:"'His team will use a testing system he helped to develop so they can simultaneously look at thousands of proteins and their effects on different cells.

"'So instead of doing these tests one by one in a test tube, which could take years, we can do them all at once,' Chien said."

Wednesday, April 04, 2007

Salon.com Looks at Industry Opposition to SB771

The headline on Salon.com read: "Biomedical industry to California legislators: 'Don't you dare tell us what to do with your money!'"

Andrew Leonard, a California author and regular on Salon.com, continued:
"The horror! To CHI (California Healthcare Institute), SB 771 is unwarranted state intervention in their profit-making potential, an act of robbery that must be resisted with extreme prejudice."
Leonard referred to the excerpts of a CHI letter seen on the California Stem Cell Report in the "Biomedical Industry" item below.

He wrote:
"As a citizen of California who voted for the state's landmark stem cell initiative, and whose tax dollars will go toward paying off the bonds issued to pay for it, I fully support legislative efforts to ensure that some of the revenue generated by the commercialization of research paid for with my money return to the state....

"If the biomedical companies don't like it, they can just go find someone else's money to play with."
Leonard also said,
"Whatever happens, I look forward to following the twists and turns of California's ambitious attempt to bootstrap stem cell research via the reporting at the California Stem Cell Report blog. I have a particular weakness for blogs that obsessively cover every iota of news about a single, highly circumscribed topic -- they seem to regularly expose me to information that is not easily found elsewhere."

Thursday, December 14, 2006

Major News Series on Stem Cells Coming Up in San Diego

A three-day series dubbed the "Stem Cell Race" begins Sunday in the San Diego Union-Tribune. Written by Terri Somers, the lengthy effort will cover the issue from Singapore to California.

Sunday will examine which country is leading the stem cell race. Monday will attempt to answer the question: "Why is Singapore spending millions in research?" And Tuesday addresses the issue of whether California can lead the U.S. in stem cell research.

Somers has closely followed stem cell issues and the California stem cell agency, and has written more on the subject in the last year than any other reporter in the state.

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