George Negus hosts this debate on the use of stem cells in medicine, featuring speakers Dr Bernadette Tobin and Professor Alan Trounson.

    •    Cure vs expensive waste of time?
    •    Strict control vs ethical free for all?
    •    Available to all vs the privileged few?

We face a stunning moment in time with extraordinary advances in translating stem cell discoveries – in particular changing one cell type to another. The promise is tangible for effective new approaches to incurable diseases. However, there is controversy about the risks and benefits in the future. This research involves expensive technology and only some parts of the population will have it available to them. Can we make it available to everyone? What is the community’s responsibility in this? Where are the boundaries and opportunities in how to access this reasonably across the world?

Host:
George Negus, former presenter/interviewer and reporter for ABCs Foreign Correspondent, Australia Talks, George Negus Tonight and Channel Nine's 60 Minutes and Today Show; Channel Seven's coverage of both Gulf Wars; SBS TV’s Dateline and TEN Network's news analysis program.

Speakers:
Professor Alan Trounson, President of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine in San Francisco, California.
Dr Bernadette Tobin PhD, Director of the Plunkett Centre for Ethics at St Vincent’s Hospital, Sydney. Reader in Philosophy at ACU.