Culturing cells in tissue culture plates.

R&D Mini-Me? New Legal Questions for Organoids

By Adithi Iyer

I have written previously about the not-so-distant possibility and promise of regenerative medicine, an area concerned with therapies that encourage the body to repair or heal itself. Cell-mediated and tissue-based technologies hold promise in inducing self-repair from within the body, and they’re making their way to market in traditional medicine. Much has been made of recently discussed CAR-T cell therapies for cancer, which have been around since 2017, and in-human sickle cell treatment Casgevy. Such applications of regenerative medicine and tissue engineering are wide-spanning and range across the bench-to-bedside pathway.

One application of regenerative medicine gaining some ground in the R&D space is the organoid. Organoids are lab-grown masses of cells and tissue that assemble to form miniature organs or organ systems in vitro. They come, too, in different forms and types, and while some organoid applications are heavily modified for specific functions, many are meant to recreate and model the naturally occurring organ systems we would find in our own bodies.

Organoids may sound especially futuristic, but are currently used regularly in labs for different research and therapeutic applications. A functional “organ” model not attached to a human body could offer the opportunity to model diseases and test treatments in real time without the need for an animal model (like the mice used today), especially in preclinical and early clinical trials for new drugs. Organoids generate information and data, and a single organoid model can even be hooked up to a “system” with other organoids to model systems and interrelated processes at once. The production of these models occurs in-lab, often involving stem cells that can divide and organize into tissues and organs on their own.

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Cell culture.

A New Theory for Gene Ownership

By James Toomey

The story of Henrietta Lacks is surely among the most famous in the history of bioethics, and its facts are well-known. Ms. Lacks sought treatment for cervical cancer. After conducting a biopsy on her tumor, her doctors learned that her cancer cells reproduced uniquely effectively. Without her knowledge or consent, her doctors derived from the cells the HeLa cell line — the world’s first immortal human cell line, worth billions and a driver of the biotechnology revolution. Lacks died in poverty.

No doubt her doctors’ behavior was not consistent with today’s standards of informed consent. But another question has remained more persistently challenging — did the doctors steal something from Lacks? Did she own the cells of her tumor? Or, perhaps more precisely, because few argue that HeLa is really the same thing as Lacks’s tumor cells, did she own the genetic information contained in her tumor?

In a new paper, Property’s Boundaries (forthcoming in the Virginia Law Review, March 2023), I develop a theory of what can and cannot be owned to answer these kinds of questions — pervasive in bioethics, from debates about ownership of organs to embryos. My conclusion, in short, is that because the essence of the idea of ownership is a relationship of absolute control, anything that can be the subject of human control can, in principle, be owned. But that which we cannot control we cannot own. From this perspective, Henrietta Lacks owned the cells of her tumor, and the tumor itself. But the genetic information within them — facts about the universe subject to no human control — simply cannot be owned, by her or anyone else.

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Syringe being filled from a vial. Vaccine concept illustration.

Is Israel Trading Medical Information for Vaccines? Ethical and Legal Considerations

By Shelly Simana

On January 7, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced that millions of vaccines are expected to arrive in Israel, and that by March, anyone who wishes to get vaccinated will be able to do so.

He concluded his speech with a controversial statement: “as part of the agreement [with Pfizer], we stipulated that Israel will serve as a global model state for a rapid vaccine rollout of an entire country… Israel will share with Pfizer, with all of humanity, the statistics that will help in developing strategies to defeat the coronavirus” (my translation, from Hebrew).

But which statistics, what kind of data, will be shared with Pfizer? This question remains a mystery.

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DNA Donors Must Demand Stronger Privacy Protection

By Mason Marks and Tiffany Li

An earlier version of this article was published in STAT.

The National Institutes of Health wants your DNA, and the DNA of one million other Americans, for an ambitious project called All of Us. Its goal — to “uncover paths toward delivering precision medicine” — is a good one. But until it can safeguard participants’ sensitive genetic information, you should decline the invitation to join unless you fully understand and accept the risks.

DNA databases like All of Us could provide valuable medical breakthroughs such as identifying new disease risk factors and potential drug targets. But these benefits could come with a high price: increased risk to individuals’ genetic data privacy, something that current U.S. laws do not adequately protect. Read More

Call for Papers: Wiet Life Sciences Scholars Conference

Loyola University Chicago’s nationally acclaimed Beazley Institute for Health Law and Policy is pleased to invite original research submissions for the annual Wiet Life Science Law Scholars Conference to be held on Friday, September 7, 2018.

The conference is designed to provide an intellectual venue for life science professors, scholars, and practitioners to convene and discuss current research and scholarship.  The phrase “life science law” intends to capture diverse disciplines that involve significant issues of life science research and development, spanning food and drug law, health law, intellectual property (IP) law, biotechnology law, environmental law, administrative law, and antitrust law.  Our goal is to foster recognition of life science law as a cohesive, dynamic area of legal study and strengthen connections among national life science law scholars.

Loyola is currently soliciting 750-1,000 word abstracts reflecting early or mid-stage ideas for the purpose of workshopping with other conference scholars.  Modeled after successful events for law professors and scholars in other areas, we will organize scholars in topical panels of three to five authors with approximately 15 minutes allotted to each abstract presentation, followed by 15 minutes of intensive discussion with scholar attendees.  Author abstracts will be distributed one week prior to the conference to scholar participants; authors may also submit draft articles for distribution.  Scholars are expected to review materials of fellow panel members.

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Biobanks as Knowledge Institutions – Seminar 11/3 at the University of Copenhagen

Biobanks as Knowledge Institutions

“Global Genes –Local Concerns” Seminar with Prof. Michael Madison (University of Pittsburgh, U.S.)

Join us at the University of Copenhagen on November 3rd, 2017 to discuss the legal implications of “Biobanks as Knowledge Institutions” with Professor Michael Madison. 

Abstract

The presentation characterizes the material and immaterial attributes of biobanks as knowledge resources, and it characterizes the broader questions that they pose as resource governance questions rather than as questions solely of law or of public policy. Biobanks are knowledge institutions. Professor Madison argues that despite the varied and diverse nature of biobanks today (indeed, precisely because of their diversity), their social and scientific importance dictates the need for a robust program of research of a comparative nature to identify shared features that contribute to their success (where they succeed) and features that likely contribute to problems or even failure. Both their importance and the associated governance challenges have only grown larger and more complex as biobanks meet the era of data science. In that regard Professor Madison points to emerging scholarly literature that focuses on governance challenges of material and data in biobank contexts, which builds on a knowledge commons governance framework. He concludes by suggesting directions for future work. Read More

Sharing Data for 21st Century Cures – Two Steps Forward…

By Mary A. Majumder, Christi J. Guerrini, Juli M. Bollinger, Robert Cook-Deegan, and Amy L. McGuire

The 21st Century Cures Act was passed with support from both sides of the aisle (imagine that!) and signed into law by then-President Obama late last year. This ambitious legislation drives action in areas as diverse as drug and device regulation and response to the opioid epidemic. It also tackles the issue of how to make data more broadly available for research use and clinical purposes. In our recently published GIM article, “Sharing data under the 21st Century Cures Act,” we examine the Act’s potential to facilitate data-sharing, in line with a recent position statement of the American College of Medical Genetics and Genomics. We highlight a number of provisions of the Act that either explicitly advance data-sharing or promote policy developments that have the potential to advance it. For example, Section 2014 of the Act authorizes the Director of National Institutes of Health to require award recipients to share data, and Section 4006 requires the Secretary of Health and Human Services to promote policies ensuring that patients have access to their electronic health information and are supported in sharing this information with others.

Just as relevant, the Act takes steps to reduce some major barriers to data sharing. An important feature of the Act, which has not been extensively publicized, is its incorporation of provisions from legislation originally proposed by Senators Elizabeth Warren and Mike Enzi to protect the identifiable, sensitive information of research subjects. Senator Warren, in particular, has been a vocal advocate of data sharing. Arguably, one of the biggest barriers to sharing is public concern about privacy. The relevant provisions address this concern chiefly via Certificates of Confidentiality. Among other things, the Act makes issuance of Certificates automatic for federally-funded research in which identifiable, sensitive information is collected and prohibits disclosure of identifiable, sensitive information by covered researchers, with only a few exceptions such as disclosure for purposes of other research. These protections became effective June 11, 2017. While NIH has signaled its awareness of the Act, it has not yet updated its Certificates of Confidentiality webpage. Read More

How should we organize consent to research biobanking in the hospital?

By Alena Buyx, MD PhD

Ever wondered what happens to the biological material you leave behind when you check out of the hospital? Nothing much, is the usual answer. However, the little bits of blood, tissue, and urine are potentially valuable for medical research; miniscule amounts of it may already allow sophisticated analyses, including genetic ones. Thus, in an approach termed ‘healthcare-embedded biobanking’, healthcare providers have started collections of leftover patient materials to create resources for future research.

However, unlike traditional research, healthcare-embedded biobanking is not done with a clear research question in mind. The materials are simply left-overs from diagnosis or treatment and, at the time of collection, the scientific projects for which they may be used eventually are entirely unclear.

This approach leads to an ethical conundrum. Established research ethics frameworks found here and here require that patients be asked for their consent and that they are given  all the information they need to make an informed decision about whether to donate their material (and its associated data) or not.  This includes, in particular, the research goals as well as the potential benefits and risks. However, this provision of information is not possible in healthcare-embedded biobanking: the risks and benefits can only be described in very broad terms, and the goals and timing of future research are usually unknown. Indeed, the materials may even not be used at all. Read More

Genomes on-line and the Health of Privacy

By Effy Vayena and Alessandro Blasimme

Technology Concept

In January 1999, Scott McNealy, CEO of Sun Microsystems (now part of Oracle Corporation), announced that we should no longer be concerned with privacy, since consumers ‘have zero privacy anyway’ and should just ‘get over it.’ His argument, that in the era of information technology we have become unable to protect precisely what such technology relies on and delivers (information) has met the full spectrum of imaginable reactions – from outrage to enthusiastic endorsement. Many different cures have been proposed to treat at least the symptoms of the disease caused by the loss of privacy. Yet there is little disagreement concerning the diagnosis itself: privacy does not enjoy an enviable state of health. Recent emphasis on big data and their inescapable presence have only made the prognosis dimmer for the once cherished ‘right to be let alone’ – as Samuel D. Warren and justice Louis D. Brandeis famously defined privacy back in 1890.

Such a deteriorating outlook should sound especially alarming in the fields of healthcare and medical research. In such domains, professional norms of medical confidentiality have long ensured sufficient levels of privacy protection, accountability, and trust. Yet we are told that this may no longer be the case: sensitive, personal, health-related information – just like any other type of information – now comes in electronic formats, which makes it much more reachable than before, and increasingly difficult to protect. Imagine the consequences this may have in the case of genomic data – arguably one of the most sensitive forms of personal information. Should such information fall into the wrong hands, we may face harsh consequences ranging from discrimination to stigmatization, loss of insurance, and worse. To enjoy the right to genomic privacy, one has to be able to exercise some meaningful amount of control over who gets access to her genetic data, be adequately shielded from harms of the sort just mentioned, and yet retain the possibility of deciphering what’s written in her DNA for a variety of purposes – including, but not limited to, health-related ones. All this is undoubtedly demanding. All the more so now that we know how even apparently innocent and socially desirable uses, like genomic research employing anonymized DNA, are not immune from the threat of malicious re-identification.

In light of such considerations, one might be led to think that health privacy protection is a lost cause. In fact, one may go even further and argue that, all things considered, we shouldn’t worry too much about the decline of privacy. Having our sensitive data in a state of highly restricted accessibility, so the argument goes, prevents us from extracting medically valuable insight from those data and hinders medical discovery from which we may all benefit. Read More

Citizen Science where there are no citizens: participation and exclusion in Antarctic science

This post is part of Bill of Health’s symposium on Critical Studies of Citizen Science in Biomedical Research. Challenging the lay-professional divide in portrayals of citizen science, Vanessa Heggie examines a case study of an expedition to the Antarctic in the 1950s, where participants were at once researchers, research subjects, experts, and technicians. Background on the symposium is here. You can call up all of the symposium contributions already published by clicking here.

By Vanessa Heggie

The Antarctic environment poses plenty of challenges for scientists, but for those who need human participants there’s the additional problem of finding and recruiting ‘citizen scientists’.  With no indigenous residents, the residents of the Antarctic are a carefully selected population, most of whom are already doing some form of scientific work and juggling multiple identities and roles.  Radio operators take readings for meteorologists, geologists volunteer as guinea pigs for physiologists, and botanists collect rocks. There isn’t a clear divide between ‘scientist’ and ‘lay participant’; often human subjects, whether they’re collecting data or acting as human guinea-pigs, understand the principles of experimental design, and are able to give feedback about the experiment itself, not just the data generated.  At what point do citizen scientists become experimental collaborators? And who gets left out of these relationships? Read More