By Hanna Wickes – The Miami Herald –
Tens of thousands of patients are boarding planes each year for stem cell treatment that no major medical body has cleared as safe or effective for what’s being sold. The clinics are charging tens of thousands of dollars per procedure. The marketing is slick. The science, in nearly every case outside of certain blood cancers, isn’t there — and a recent U.S. court fight over who gets to regulate this industry has only sharpened the stakes for people considering it.
That gap between what’s promised and what’s proven is the heart of what researchers call “stem cell tourism,” and it’s reshaping how doctors talk to patients about hope, risk and what counts as medicine.
