Oh, Good. A Biotech Company Has Been Given Permission From The U.S. Government To Raise The Dead

A U.S. biotech firm is about to do something very bad.

No, they aren’t going to wreck the car. They are going to raise the dead.

The U.S. government granted Bioquark permission to begin testing a new stem cell therapy on humans who are clinically dead, in the hopes that they can bring them back to life.

Hmmmmm. From The Guardian:

A biotech company in the US has been granted ethical permission to recruit 20 patients who have been declared clinically dead from a traumatic brain injury, to test whether parts of their central nervous system can be brought back to life.

Scientists will use a combination of therapies, which include injecting the brain with stem cells and a cocktail of peptides, as well as deploying lasers and nerve stimulation techniques which have been shown to bring patients out of comas.

Hmmmmmmmm.

The tests will be performed on 20 patients who have been kept alive via life support machines, and will entail months of monitoring to determine any efficacy.

The trial participants will have been certified dead and only kept alive through life support. They will be monitored for several months using brain imaging equipment to look for signs of regeneration, particularly in the upper spinal cord – the lowest region of the brain stem which controls independent breathing and heartbeat.

The team believes that the brain stem cells may be able to erase their history and re-start life again, based on their surrounding tissue – a process seen in the animal kingdom in creatures like salamanders who can regrow entire limbs.

Then, zombies human salamanders everywhere. Somehow, the CEO of Bioquark sees this as a good thing.

Dr Ira Pastor, the CEO of Bioquark Inc. said: “This represents the first trial of its kind and another step towards the eventual reversal of death in our lifetime.

The company received permission from the Institutional Review Board at the National Institutes of Health, who determine whether experiments on people are ethically permissible. This somehow made the cut.

Bioquark said they are going to begin recruiting subjects immediately. The first round of experiments will not attempt to revive them completely, which is good, I guess.

No, that will come later.

The first stage, named ‘First In Human Neuro-Regeneration & Neuro-Reanimation’ will be a non-randomised, single group ‘proof of concept’ and will take place at Anupam Hospital in Rudrapur, Uttarakhand India.

The peptides will be administered into the spinal cord daily via a pump, with the stem cells given bi-weekly, over the course of a 6 week period.

Dr Pastor added: “It is a long term vision of ours that a full recovery in such patients is a possibility, although that is not the focus of this first study – but it is a bridge to that eventuality.”

Well, at least the car will be okay.