The latest results from a trial in which five Huntington's disease (HD) patients received fetal nerve tissue transplants show that the treatment can slow, but not stop the progression of the condition. The study, carried out at the Henri Mondor Hospital in France, shows that for some patients, cell transplants...
A US court was today due to begin hearing the opening statements in a pair of lawsuits seeking to have the state of California's stem cell programme overturned. The claimants want to invalidate the law that created the California Institute of Regenerative Medicine (CIRM), which is authorised to distribute $3...
The Fertility Society of Australia (FSA) is planning an advertising campaign warning of the factors that can affect fertility, the Age newspaper reports. The society says the ads, the first of their kind in the country, will be about 'IVF doctors stopping people from having IVF'. It hopes to draw...
European regulators have rejected a licence application for a new drug based on a human protein extracted from the milk of genetically altered goats. If the drug had been given the go-ahead by the European Medicines Agency (EMEA), it would have been the first treatment of its kind to be...
Australian and US researchers have discovered that the gene responsible for 'maleness' could explain why men are 50 per cent more likely than women to develop Parkinson's disease (PD). The scientists, based at Prince Henry's Institute in Melbourne and the University of California in Los Angeles, have shown that SRY...
Dutch researchers have discovered why women are more likely to conceive non-identical twins as they get older. Their findings, published early online in the journal Human Reproduction, show that as women age, rising levels of follicle stimulating hormone (FSH) can push their ovaries into 'overdrive'. This increases the chances of...
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Genetics and insurance: fighting the wrong battle?
by Dr Alison Stewart
The last two weeks have seen yet another outcry on the topic of 'genetic discrimination' in insurance. The main thrust of the argument is that because we cannot do anything about our genes it should be illegal to treat us differently on the basis of our genetic risk of death...