Asia’s Regenerative Medicine Evolution
It’s no secret that regenerative medicine is quickly working its way into every nook and cranny of the American medical system, but other countries aren’t far behind.
China has been growing its regenerative medicine sector for the last two decades and providing the world with critical research findings regarding stem cells, tissue engineering, and gene therapy. However, China’s own framework threatens to hold back the country’s growth in this area. Can they roll out a sustainable regenerative medicine network?
Meanwhile, Japanese professor Shinya Yamanaka won the 2012 Nobel Prize for his work in stem cell biology and consequently instigated a flurry of attention to the country’s own regenerative medicine capabilities. Now, only four years later, regenerative medicine is poised to dominate Japan’s medical network with everything from lab-grown livers to regenerated cartilage.
The Vital Components of Regenerative Medicine
Regenerative medicine, in its most basic form, gives the body the tools it needs to naturally repair itself. Though the body’s organs and tissues are designed to self-renew, age, injury, and environmental factors often severely limit the chances for effective healing to take place. This is where regenerative medicine steps in to restore organ and tissue function and strengthen the body enough to fight disease.
Stem cell technology and tissue engineering sit at the heart of regenerative medicine. They can replace and regenerate the cells, tissues, and organs that the body needs to survive, heal, and thrive. However, regenerative medicine is hardly a one-size-fits-all strategy. Every condition, disease, and injury requires its own research and medical investigation before it can be resolved.
China’s Years of Progress
China’s main and local governments both recognize the vital importance of regenerative medicine to keepings it large population healthy, so they have strongly supported regenerative medicine policies and offered the funding necessary for development. In the last 17 years, more than 30 regenerative medicine centers have been built in China to work with other advanced countries.
China’s largest obstacle right now is devising a way to take the leap from principles to practice. They need standards, regulations, and management practices, as well as an influx of health care experts, in order to accelerate into the next phase of regenerative medicine health care.
Japan Launches Into Stem Cell Market
Shinya Yamanaka was a professor at Kyoto University when he won the Nobel Prize for his work in stem cell biology in 2012, and his achievement has since sent a shockwave of energy into Japan’s science and medical sectors. Yamanaka discovered that any human cell can be genetically reprogrammed to an embryonic state, known as an induced pluripotent stem cell. Now Japanese companies are collecting huge banks of stem cells to use in clinical trials for everything from heart disease and diabetes to spinal cord injury and Parkinson’s Disease.
Experts estimate that regenerative medicine will become a $950 million industry by 2020, and an astonishing $10 billion by 2030. These numbers, combined with Yamanaka’s research, persuaded the Japanese government to ease up on their approval restrictions, so Japan is now known as one the world’s easiest places to place a regenerative medicine product on the market.
Overall, Asia is positioning itself to become a leader in regenerative medicine, an achievement that has the potential to revolutionize how Asian countries handle the health and wellness of its sizeable aging population.
