With that, no private company would be doing stem cell research anymore despite grants available from the Economic Development Board. ESI would join CordLife and Stem Cell Technologies in being focussed entirely on revenue generation. [4] 

The key problem was that private funding was difficult to get for scientific work of such great uncertainty and very long gestation, a problem not confined to Singapore. ESI, for instance, began in 2002 as a joint venture between the Economic Development Board and an Australia-based private investment group, but the board has since become the company's majority owner. [5] 

Faced with this stark reality, but not wanting to abandon research altogether, Singapore appears to have chosen to put it in the public sector. Alan Colman, ESI's former CEO, moved to become head of the Institute of Medical Biology's stem cell lab, (under A*STAR) taking with him about 20 former ESI staff. No doubt with the reshuffling, there would be huge increases in state funding.

Still, more bad news was to come.

David and Birgitte Lane

In September 2007, David Lane and his wife, Birgitte, a well-known researcher in skin cells, decided to move back to Scotland, attracted by an offer from the University of Dundee's College of Life Sciences, including new lab facilities. This was barely 2 months after Lane became Chief Executive Officer of the Singapore government's newly-formed Experimental Therapeutics Centre which focusses on discovering and developing new drugs. [6] 

Besides the instability of such movements of key people, there is also an overarching problem -- the great shortage of PhDs in Singapore. "The republic's educational system has not been geared toward creating the kind of creative-minded individuals for breakthroughs to occur," said Kirpal Singh, professor of creativity at the Singapore Management University.

In 2006, local universities produced 520 science and technology PhDs, or 115 per million of population. That doesn't compare very well with 235 per million in Sweden, 177 in Finland and 175 in Switzerland, according to A*STAR.

Worse, Bloomberg reported that only 80, or 15 percent, of those receiving PhDs locally were Singaporean, though it is not clear whether it meant 15% of science and technology PhDs or all PhDs [7]. To get more PhD-qualified researchers, generous scholarships of S$1 million are now being provided to students to study overseas.

Meanwhile, research in other countries are yielding therapies, though they are based on a different technology -- adult stem cells. Baltimore-based Osiris Therapeutics Inc is marketing Osteocel, which uses adult stem cells gathered from bone marrow to generate new bone. Bangkok-based TheraVitae Co. is marketing VesCell, used to treat heart disease.

Singapore, which seems to have chosen (exclusively?) the embryonic stem cell route, has not yet commercialised any treatment. "There is this short-term view of 'Wow, this is potentially possible in three years or five years," says William Chia, a researcher at Temasek Life Sciences Laboratory, a molecular biology and genetics research institute sponsored by Temasek Holdings.. "It's almost never realistic," he added, though "in the long term, stem cells have a tremendous potential." [8]

However, in the US, Advance Cell Technology and Geron Corp may be ahead of the game; they hope to win approval from US regulators this year to begin the first clinical trial using embryonic stem cells. [9] 

Other countries, e.g. Japan, South Korea and Australia are also building up their stem cell research capabilities, as are China, India and Thailand, though the latter trio's safety standards tend to be seen as lax. Still, competition is going to be fierce, not least for top talent.

* * * * *

 
With stem cell research in Singapore now becoming virtually all government-funded, and after spending S$500 million in building Biopolis, the science park dedicated to biomedical sciences, with millions more on personnel and operating costs, the question of accountability to the public takes on greater importance.

In itself, public funding of scientific research is not necessarily wrong. With such work, it may be the only sustainable model. But it does mean that a greater effort should be made to inform the tax-payer what is going on, what are the risks involved, and to provide a fair prognosis.

Instead, there is a tendency, every time our local media touches on stem cell research, to adopt a tone of boosterism: How well Singapore is doing, how setbacks are not really setbacks and how the future is definitely bright.

For example, when David and Birgitte Lane decided to move back to Scotland, A*STAR, through the Straits Times assured readers that his work here – now reduced to 3 months in a year for the next 3 years – was "still a top priority."

His efforts in building up the biomedical sciences here will continue full throttle, the newspaper quoted Lim Chuan Poh, current chairman of A*STAR as saying. [10] 

"Biomed is no bubble that has burst", said a Straits Times headline two days later. The use of the all-purpose term "biomed" had the unfortunate effect of conflating the issue of stem cell research with the manufacturing of drugs and medical devices (which hard data does indicate is growing strongly). "Research is now streamlined under the public sector," reporter Liaw Wy-Cin wrote, careful to speak of setbacks like ESI halting research and ViaCell leaving Singapore altogether, as efficiency improvements ("streamlined").

The departure of David Lane was described as good for Singapore. "When David travels and speaks at conferences," the newspaper quoted Lim Chuan Poh of the A*STAR as saying, "he talks about the work he does at the University of Dundee in Scotland and in Singapore."

Liaw wrote: "Under A*STAR's model, work for its star foreign scientists is ongoing, wherever they may be."

But hang on, what does this mean? What is meant by "model"? Are we paying people to work elsewhere? If so, who would have the patent rights to the discoveries? To be fair, I doubt if we are really throwing money around like that, but this kind of "no need to worry" story brushes off serious questions and an honest assessment of the situation.

The government and the media owe it to the people to do a better job of reporting. Especially as this is a very new and complex field requiring oodles of money, and especially as Singaporeans are on the whole scientifically illiterate -- just look at how many are falling for creationist mumbo-jumbo, for example -- it is really important to be forthright about what's going on.

There is a need to explain to a level of detail that perhaps even journalists themselves do not quite understand, and therefore may not know how to ask questions. Take for example the way "research" is a very broad term that encompasses a whole gamut of activities, from very basic research that is aimed primarily at making discoveries, to applications research that seeks to convert that knowledge into something useful, to designing therapies and products that involve highly expensive and rigorous clinical trials for safety and effectiveness.

Along the way there should be questions like who has patent rights to the research, a highly germane question, I'm sure, for a city-state like Singapore where the great majority of researchers are not Singaporean, and where the top guys move from one institute to another fairly quickly. Furthermore, what if basic research is done here, but applications research is done elsewhere? Unless patent rights are clear, the commercial benefits may prove elusive.

Then there's the question: Are we right to concentrate on embryonic stem cell research? Why do we seem to be ignoring adult stem cells? Granted, the theory is that embryonic stem cells are pluripotential -- capable of differentiating into all kinds of organ cells, and therefore in the long run may prove of greater flexibility and economic reward. Adult stem cells, on the other hand, are much more limited in their uses. But  the latter however do not present the ethical question about the use of embryos [11] and may be easier to commercialise.