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| Blind Calgary Baby Travelling Overseas for Stem Cell Therapy |
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| Optic Nerve Hypoplasia | |||
| Friday, 03 October 2008 00:20 | |||
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Source: CBC  10-month-old boy believed to be 1st Canadian child to undergo treatment The Calgary parents of a 10-month-old blind baby are heading to China in the hopes stem cell therapy will give him some sight. Jakob Bielskis has optic nerve hypoplasia, which means the nerves from his eyes to his brain failed to develop properly in utero. There are no drugs, treatments or surgeries offered in Canada for his condition. Desperate to give their son some vision, Jakob's mother, Dawn Villeneuve, found a company in China that began offering stem cell transplants to foreign patients in May. The company claims the 18 children that have undergone the treatment have recovered some vision. Doctors will inject millions of stem cells to try to stimulate Jakob's optic nerves. Stem cells are in early stages of development and have the ability to become any type of cell to form skin, bones, organs or other body parts. The therapy is controversial in North America because the best source of stem cells is human embryos. Villeneuve said the family's doctors don't support their decision. "They often give me opinions based on adult stem cells, or embryonic stem cells, which are not what we're using. It's umbilical cord stem cells which come from live births, from the placenta of a healthy baby that's born," she told CBC News on Friday. "It's not coming from abortions or other things that might be morally questionable." The family, which leaves for China on Saturday, believes the benefits are greater than the risks. "Anything that's ever been new has always been controversial — heart transplants, blood transplants, insulin, immunization," said Rena Charney, Jakob's grandmother. "This is another one." Richard Bielskis, Jakob's father, admits he's nervous about the procedure, but said they have to try. "For his mother and I to know that we did everything that we could, you know, that makes us feel that we did our part," he said. It's believed Jakob will be the first Canadian child to receive the treatment.
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