page_title: Timothy Caulfield
section_title: "Scienceploitation" and stem cell tourism
hierarchical_section_title: Timothy Caulfield / "Scienceploitation" and stem cell tourism
caption_attribution_description: English: Timothy Caulfield CSICon 2018 Scienceploitation Pop Culture’s Assault on Science (and why it matters)
context_page_description: Timothy Allen Caulfield is a Canadian professor of law at the University of Alberta, the Research Director of its Health Law Institute, and current Canada Research Chair in Health Law and Policy. He specializes in legal, policy and ethical issues in medical research and its commercialization. In addition to professional publications, he is the author of several books aimed at the general reader, and the host of a television documentary series debunking pseudoscientific myths.
context_section_description: Caulfield has advocated for medical professionals to not exaggerate potential benefits of new unproven treatments in fields that have only long-term potential. Stem cell treatments in particular is sometimes fraudulently hyped as a very expensive miracle cure for anything from autism, Lou Gehrig’s disease and spinal cord injury, to cerebral palsy, a practice Caulfield calls "scienceploitation".
  In addition to plain dishonesty, Caulfield argues that the media looking for human-interest stories often portray unsound treatments as effective and give hope to patients. Researchers face pressure to present their research as being more advanced than it actually is and to respond to commercialization imperatives.
  Caulfield points out that these practices have been used all the way back to the discovery of magnetism, and tend to appear whenever new scientific discoveries attract the interest of the public: "Now you see stem cell, genetic, and increasingly, microbiome research being exploited to sell a host of ridiculous products. My favorite example, however, has to be the use of “quantum physics.” Many alternative medicine practitioners seem to think that if they slap the word “quantum” on a product it sounds more science-y and more legitimate."
caption: Caulfield speaking about "scienploitation" at CSICon 2018 in Las Vegas
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