Dark Clouds on CIRM Horizon?

The deconstruction of the CIRM, enacted by California, is earnestly to be wished. That won’t happen, but at the very least, given its many troubles, a good reorganization is needed. That is apparently the idea behind a bill in California. From the story in Entrepreneur.Com (no link):

California Sen. Sheila Kuehl introduced a bill Friday to study the structure of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine—the agency created to distribute $3 billion in state bond funds for embryonic stem cell research—and to require therapies from the research to help the state’s neediest residents. Kuehl, D-Santa Monica, and Sen. George Runner, R-Lancaster, authored the legislation, S.B. 1565.The Kuehl-Runner bill requires that publicly funded programs get the best prices for stem cell therapies and drugs by requiring CIRM grant winners and licensees to sell them to those programs at a price that does not exceed one of the benchmark prices in Cal-Rx, the state’s prescription drug discount program.The bill also calls for the state’s Little Hoover Commission to study the existing governance structure of San Francisco-based CIRM and report to the Legislature by July 1, 2009…”The bill will … help ensure the public’s trust by identifying ways to increase public accountability and reduce conflicts of interest,” Kuehl said in a prepared statement.

Poor Sheila actually bought the propaganda about the researchers paying back the state if they hit the jackpot. I think I’ll try to sell her that worthless swampland I inherited. Expect the entrepreneurs of science to push back hard on this one.