Promises, Promises

I guess after a while you get jaded to these kinds of things:

British doctors have announced they have cured a man with diabetes by injecting pancreatic cells into his liver.

Even so, I get a brief moment of "oh my god" before I look a little further to find an article with more information:

There are still drawbacks, especially the lifelong reliance on those anti-rejection drugs and the problems caused by a severe shortage of pancreases, with about 800 donated annually in Britain. Few organs are suitable for harvesting cells as many of those donated are needed for full organ transplants or come from diabetic patients whose kidneys have also failed. But scientists hope that the overall drug cocktail will be reduced and they hope that islet cells, perhaps using stem cells, can be taught to trick the body into pro ducing more of its own, thus ekeing out short supplies. Alternatively more islet cells might be grown in the lab. Vaccines could prevent the body from attacking new islet cells.

So let's see how it shakes out:

1. You have a disease that requires daily insulin injections to survive.
2. You get new islet cells injected into your liver, although a source of such cells is not available.
3. You take anti-rejection drugs on a daily basis, which btw screws up your entire immune system.
4. Maybe one day someone will come up with a vaccine to prevent your body from attacking the islet cells.

Don't get me wrong. I am very, very glad people are whacking away at the problem. Stem cells, immunological research, transplantation techniques -- they are all part of a very complex problem. What pisses me off is the complete cluelessness of our headline-a-minute media in summarizing this as "Cell Transplant Cures Diabetes". Yours in frustration...