Medical Tourism for Gene Therapy
Like so many other fields of modern biotechnology, gene therapy is more commercialized and progressing more rapidly outside increasingly regulated Western regions. From BusinessWeek: "In the West, this experimental branch of biomedicine suffered major setbacks following the death of one patient in a clinical trial in 1999. Other patients later came down with cancer as a result of their added genes, and the U.S. Food & Drug Administration halted a number of trials. That created an opportunity for Chinese researchers. Without the same regulatory obstacles, they were able to take ideas that originated in the U.S. but stagnated there. ... If I were making a long-term investment in biotech, and particularly in gene therapy, I would be making it in China, not here. They have figured out how to get [gene therapy] approved."
Link: http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/06_10/b3974104.htm