A Chinese stem-cell therapies boom and bust?

The Chinese Ministry of Health has a new battle to fight: closing down stem-cell clinics.

A recent article by Nature sheds some light on the booming and seemingly very lucrative business of stem-cell treatments for a range of diseases including autism or Parkinson. The problem? There is to date no scientific evidence that stem-cell therapies actually work.

A law passed in 2009 even requires those offering stem-cell procedures to  present clinical data supporting their efficacy and to secure approval from the Health Ministry. Unfortunately weak capacity of implementation and enforcement coupled with grey legal areas has created niches for experimentation.

Stem-cell therapies may well prove one day to be very promising avenues. Clinical trials run over many years will however be the only way to demonstrate the efficacy of Chinese stem-cell therapies.

Quid pro quo

The Chinese Internet sphere is once again the target of a tightening of rules in an attempt to clarify national security reviews of foreign investments in Chinese companies

Variable interest entities (VIE) – a scheme in which a Chinese company holds an operating license but control rests in foreign hands – is bound to come under increased scrutiny from the legislator. The hic? Some of the major players (including Google, Baidu, Sina, Youku or Renren) and thousands of smaller Internet players are using VIEs.

While giving more leeway to the regulator, this new rule is, in essence, not very different from the role played by the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) which has in recent years blocked Huawei’s acquisition of two US technology companies (2Wire and 3Com).