CIRM asks patients how to spend last $800m for stem cell therapies

The California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM) is asking patient advocates how the agency should spend the last $800m of the $3bn that the state raised through bond sales to fund stem cell research, and the answer at a recent hearing in San Diego wasn't surprising: "Spend it on me."

Of course patients with few good treatment options and few new drugs in the development pipeline are eager for research funding into alternative therapies with the potential to greatly improve or cure their disease. But how does an agency charged with funding research in a broad field like stem cell therapies decide which diseases its public funds should back