The News Focus story "Fetal cells again?" (C. Holden, 16 October, p. 358) indicates that fetal cell transplants for Parkinson's disease patients fell out of favor after control studies suggested that placebo effects may have accounted for positive results. However, there were no proven placebo effects in previous clinical trials. The reason that new trials are funded in Europe is that previous trials used outdated methods for cell therapy.
No takes yet. Share an insight, caveat, or question.
Ole Isacson (2009) studied this question.