David Burrowes
Main Page: David Burrowes (Conservative - Enfield, Southgate)Department Debates - View all David Burrowes's debates with the Department of Health and Social Care
(13 years ago)
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Mr David Burrowes (Enfield, Southgate) (Con)
May I be the first warmly to welcome the Secretary of State’s statement and to make a bid for the catalyst fund for regenerative medicine, which not only offers great hope for the future but is providing life-saving treatment through umbilical cord blood? I refer him to the recommendation the UK stem cell strategic forum made last year for collaboration between universities, hospitals and farming industries to make greater use of the application of cord blood now and in future.
Mr Lansley
I am grateful to my hon. Friend and heartily welcome his support for the opportunities in regenerative medicine. I was fortunate enough to meet at the UK Stroke Forum last Thursday, among those exhibiting, a company that is based in England but undertaking trials and research activity in Scotland and is looking precisely at how it can use foetal-derived stem cells for regenerative purposes. The right hon. Member for Leigh (Andy Burnham) talked about Pfizer. In my constituency, it has been one of the companies leading the development of new regenerative medicine techniques. That is clearly one of the areas that this country has tremendous potential in developing. The technology innovation centre for regenerative medicine was announced in the “Plan for Growth” published alongside the Budget earlier this year, and I hope that it will be one of the areas in which we will see those developments.