A national stem cell advocacy group
this week ripped the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for
“dismantling” its Center for Regenerative Medicine, describing
the move as a "setback" for the entire field.
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Bernard Siegel
GPI photo |
The Genetics Policy Institute (GPI)
said the action was a “huge disappointment” in an email sent out
internationally by Bernard Siegel, executive director of the group,
which stages the heavily attended World Stem Cell Summit.
The NIH move also has implications
for the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine(CIRM), whose
$3 billion program is down to its last $600 million.
The GPI was reacting
to news in the journal Nature that the NIH said its center “will not continue in
its present form.” The head of the NIH program,
Mahendra Rao, took
a job this month with the
New York Stem Cell Foundation.
James
Anderson, director of the NIH’s Division of Program Coordination,
Planning, and Strategic Initiatives, told Nature that the $52 million
NIH effort was going to be rethought following a workshop in May.
Siegel said,
“The dismantling of the program
appears to be a retreat by the United States from the translational
imperative and a setback for the field at large. The patient
community will be looking to Dr. Collins(head of the NIH) and others in NIH leadership
to fulfill their commitment to stem cell development as a singular
priority. Other countries are pouring in resources and moving full
steam ahead. The NIH’s failure to continue the program represents
more than just a case bureaucratic bungling. What we see here is a
lack of vision and a public relations blunder. Years of valuable work
and planning just tossed away. The scientific community and the
public rightfully believes regenerative medicine will one day provide
innovative treatments and cures to chronic diseases. The decision to
tear down the Center for Regenerative Medicine, without first
providing an alternative plan, undermines the credibility of NIH. A
huge disappointment."
Asked for a response this week by the
California Stem Cell Report, Amanda Fine, a public affairs specialist
at the NIH, said in an email,
“The NIH Intramural Center for
Regenerative Medicine has not closed. This is a fast evolving
area of science and NIH decided to step back and reassess what the
field needs in 2014 and beyond and where NIH can have the greatest
impact. NIH is holding a workshop tentatively scheduled for May 5
that will convene a group of experts in the field to address current
obstacles to translation of cell therapies and will help prioritize a
number of requirements that the larger community has articulated
through white papers over the past two years. NIH will consider
the feedback from the workshop and establish a set of goals for the
CRM.
Initially, Fine asked that the NIH
statement not be attributed to a specific individual but later
said it could be attributed to James
Anderson, who also made the statements to Nature.
Public details of the NIH program and
its problems are murky. But the NIH action has implications for the
California stem cell agency, which is scheduled to run out of cash
for new awards in 2017. The agency is attempting to raise funds to
continue beyond that point.
The agency could use the news to argue
that now, more than ever, it is necessary to support stem cell
research efforts in California because of weak federal support, which
ebbs and flows depending on political vagaries. On the other hand,
some might interpret the NIH rollback as a sign that those
well-informed in the field have judged it to be less-than-ready for
prime time, an argument that could be extended to California's
efforts.
What the NIH action clearly does is
create more uncertainty concerning progress in stem cell research.
Uncertainty is an anathema to businesses that may be considering
where to invest hundreds of millions of dollars.
