Leigh Turner, Ph.D.

Leigh Turner, Ph.D.

Professor and Executive Director, UCI Bioethics Program

Biography

Leigh Turner is Executive Director of the University of California, Irvine Bioethics Program and a Professor in the Program in Public Health’s Department of Health, Society, and Behavior. His primary research program addresses ethical, legal, and social issues related to stem cells and regenerative medicine products. In particular, he uses approaches from bioethics and the social sciences to study businesses and clinics engaged in direct-to-consumer marketing of unproven and unlicensed cell-based interventions. Professor Turner’s research in this area is funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts. He also studies ethical issues related to such topics as pay-to-participate clinical studies, crowdfunding for medical care, and cross-border health-related travel. Turner is a co- editor of Risks and Challenges in Medical Tourism: Understanding the Global Market for Health Services and The View from Here: Bioethics and the Social Sciences.

Turner was previously an Associate Professor at the University of Minnesota Center for Bioethics and School of Public Health; Associate Professor and William Dawson Scholar at McGill University’s Biomedical Ethics Unit and Department of Social Studies of Medicine; Clinical Assistant Professor at the University of Toronto Joint Centre for Bioethics and Clinical Ethicist at Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care and Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre; and a Research Associate at The Hastings Center. He has been a Visiting Fellow at the Brocher Foundation in Hermance, Switzerland; Erasmus Mundus Visiting Scholar, Radboud University Nijmegen, the Netherlands; Distinguished Visiting Fellow, Comparative Program on Health and Society, University of Toronto Munk School of Global Affairs, Toronto, Ontario, Canada; Member, School of Social Science, Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, New Jersey, USA; National Endowment for the Humanities/Sealy & Smith Foundation Visiting Scholar, University of Texas Medical Branch Institute for the Medical Humanities, Galveston, Texas; and Ryan Bioethicist in Residence, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale, Illinois, USA.

Professor Turner is a member of the International Society for Stem Cell Research’s Ethics Committee and Membership Committee, the International Society for Cell & Gene Therapy’s Presidential Task Force on the Use of Unproven and/or Unethical Cell and Gene Therapies, and the National Institutes of Health’s Novel and Exceptional Technology and Research Advisory Committee.

Research in Lay Terms

"My research addresses ethical, legal, and social issues related to U.S. businesses and international companies engaged in direct-to-consumer marketing of unlicensed and unproven stem cell interventions. Using research methods drawn from the social sciences, I investigate the claims such businesses make about where they are located, what diseases and injuries they purport to treat, what types of cell-based interventions and other regenerative medicine products they sell, and how much such procedures cost. This empirical approach is integrated with ethical analysis of the marketing claims, commercial practices, and clinical activities of such businesses. My research explores the implications inaccurate marketing representations have for informed consent, patient safety, public health, and public understanding of stem cell research and regenerative medicine."

Research Focus

"My primary research program addresses ethical, legal, and social issues related to stem cell research and the field of regenerative medicine. My work provides an empirical analysis and ethical critique of businesses engaged in advertising and administering unlicensed and unproven stem cell interventions. I have examined direct-to-consumer marketing by such businesses in Canada and the United States, addressed various ethical issues related to such commercial and clinical activity, explored legal and policy environments for stem cell interventions and other regenerative medicine products, identified and critiqued ‘’pay-to-participate” stem cell studies, worked with Professor Jeremy Snyder to analyze crowdfunding campaigns established by individuals seeking unproven stem cell interventions, considered how “right-to-try” legislation might change access to stem cell products, and tracked changes in marketing representations as some companies have claimed to offer treatments, preventive interventions, or “immune boosters” in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Funded by the Pew Charitable Trusts, my research team and I are proceeding from this existing body of research to examine understudied features of the U.S. marketplace for unlicensed and unproven stem cell interventions."

Research Details

In the United States and elsewhere around the world, hundreds and possibly thousands of businesses are selling purported stem cell treatments that are not approved by national regulators and are unsupported by convincing evidence of safety and efficacy. Businesses advertise putative stem cell therapies for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, autism spectrum disorder, cerebral palsy, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, multiple sclerosis, muscular dystrophy, Parkinson’s disease, osteoarthritis, spinal cord injuries, sports- related musculoskeletal injuries, and many other diseases and injuries. Some patients have suffered serious injuries after being administered such unproven and unapproved products. Other patients have experienced substantial financial losses after being subjected to “hard sell” sales tactics by such businesses. In addition to posing risks to individual patients, some companies selling unproven stem cell products engage in activities with harmful collective consequences, such as circulating health-related misinformation on corporate websites and social media platforms, making misleading claims about the Food and Drug Administration and other regulators, blurring important distinctions between treatment and research, diverting individuals from opportunities to participate in well-designed and carefully conducted clinical trials, and claiming to reduce transmission of SARS-CoV-2 and prevent COVID-19 by selling supposedly “immune-boosting” stem cell products that in reality are not backed by convincing evidence of safety and efficacy.

Using empirical research methods from the social sciences and methods and theories from bioethics, my research addresses ethical, legal, and social issues related to direct-to- consumer marketing of unlicensed and unproven stem cell products. My research explores marketing claims made by such businesses and the personal and collective consequences of what often are inaccurate and misleading advertising claims. Over the next two years, my research team and I will pay particular attention to the U.S. direct-to- consumer marketplace for putative stem cell treatments. We will identify and address ethical issues related to such commercial and clinical practices, examine laws and regulations that incentivize or constrain problematic marketing practices and clinical activities, consider how regulators such as the Food and Drug Administration, Federal Trade Commission, state medical boards, and state attorneys general offices should respond to such business operations, and explore what can be done to increase the likelihood that when patients are administered stem cell products they are provided interventions backed by convincing evidence of safety and efficacy. This research program is supported by funding from the Pew Charitable Trusts.

Publications Addressing Ethical, Legal, and Social Issues Related to Stem Cell Research and Regenerative Medicine

Leigh Turner, The American stem cell sell in 2021: U.S. businesses selling unlicensed and unproven stem cell interventions, Cell Stem Cell, Volume 28, Issue 11, 2021, Pages 1891-1895, ISSN 1934-5909, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.stem.2021.10.008.  November 4, 2021.

Related Links

Noncompliant-a podcast about neurodiversity and human rights, 2021; Stem Cells for Autism

MinnPost, 2020; Unproven stem cell products are being peddled as COVID-19 ‘therapies’

RegMedNet, 2018; Understanding the landscape of direct-to-consumer marketing in Canada

The Stem Cell Podcast, 2017: Episode 106: Ethical Concerns

RegMedNet, 2017; “Pay-to-participate stems cells studies”