On June 29, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee approved, by voice vote, the Bone Marrow and Cord Blood Therapy and Research Act (S. 1317). The House approved a similar measure (H.R. 2520) on May 24 (see The Source, 5/27/05).
Sponsored by Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-UT), S. 1317 would authorize $15 million annually through FY2010 for a cord blood stem cell inventory to collect and maintain 150,000 units of blood obtained from umbilical cords. Under the bill, blood could be made available for transplantation or peer-reviewed clinical research.
During consideration of the bill, the committee approved, by unanimous consent, a substitute amendment offered by Sen. Hatch that would include a provision in the House bill authorizing $34 million in FY2006 and $38 million annually through FY2010 to expand the National Bone Marrow Registry to include information on cord blood transplants. Under the substitute, the registry would be renamed the “C.W. Bill Young Cell Transplantation Program.” The substitute would include a recommendation made by the Institute of Medicine to establish a National Cord Blood Policy Board that would advise the Department of Health and Human Services on issues of policy “regarding the donation, collection and uses of umbilical cord blood.” Finally, the substitute would establish a stem cell therapeutic outcomes database to “conduct an ongoing evaluation of the scientific and clinical status of transplantation involving recipients of bone marrow from biologically unrelated donors and recipients of a stem cell therapeutics product from a donor.”
In a press release announcing committee passage of S. 1317, Sen. Hatch stated, “I see no greater way to promote life than finding a way to defeat untimely death and disease, and therapies from cord blood may be able to do just that…This bill is a critical step in demonstrating the commitment of the federal government behind this new, widely supported field of stem cell research.”
