Well, I won my bet with myself, although there was little chance I would lose: As expected, the American media has utterly ignored the story that UK scientists have transformed umbilical cord blood stem cells into “mini livers,” not working livers, mind you, but liver tissue the size of a dime that can be used in drug testing and, hopefully, will one day be developed into a therapy for liver disease. Indian media reported it. So did Australian news. There was even a small report in Turkey.
Sadly, the research breakthrough just wasn’t up to rigorous US media standards since the scientists didn’t use the right kind of stem cells.
But they shouldn’t lose hope! They still have time to receive American media acclaim. All they have to do is go back to the lab and do it again—only this time with mouse embryonic stem cells. Then, the New York Times is sure to put their pictures on the front page.
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