Quote:
Originally Posted by christiangirl
You can call me ignorant but you're being ignorant of my point: Ish happens. People die from all sorts of things so, if a person WANTS the all-or-nothing option, they should be allowed to do so if it's available.
I have personal recollection of a man who was treated with an HIV drug cocktail that DID kill him because it was the wrong combination of drugs for his body. Taking the wrong cocktail is "not a big risk" now but it wasn't always that way. There is reduced risk now because medicine is more advanced and the correct combinations can be pinpointed without so much trial-and-error. Who is to say that, if this option were worth pursuing and the proper research was done, stem cell research wouldn't be so risky for future generations? You speak as though stem cell transplants will always carry the risk they do now but given how many have said more research and testing should have been done before this announcement, I would think it'd be obvious that this thread isn't solely about the possibility of today.
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You know I'm a physician, right? When we do informed consent, we don't get to just tell people, "Oh yeah, there are risks in everything...I mean, you could get hit by a bus walking across the road." Yes, there are risks in everything, but the levels of risk are different and have to be quantified. You don't really need to instruct me in why HIV meds are better now than they used to be...I'm quite aware of the medical advances which you so poorly elucidated. Your recollections, however, are incorrect, the man you recall that died from a "wrong combination of drugs for his body" is not an accurate description of HIV therapy. Drugs are NOT prescribed based on anyone's "body type." He may have had side effects from the drugs, but he didn't have the "wrong combination" unless someone just made a gross mistake.
I understand that this is research, but if you'd READ my original post, you'd see that the point I was making was that the consequence of being cured of HIV was really just a side benefit of being treated for leukemia. It was not to primary goal of therapy. While people might think of this as future therapy, IMHO (which I get to have with a little more credibility than you, btw) it is not very likely due to the high risks involved with the treatment. Yeah, it's great if you can cure a disease that kills 25% of people that are infected in 10 years (using assumed stats for emphasis) but kills 50% of patients treated in less than 2 weeks. Those risks are greater than the risk of the disease itself.
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