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Biotech booms in China

nature.com

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Re: Biotech booms in China

#11

Post by qiqing »

Bucephalus355 wrote: post #3

This does not seem good. The world has never really reconciled the biological and chemical atrocities that went on in Asia during WWII and since, like they have in Europe. The Japanese used chemical gas attacks (munitions of unexploded gas are still found in China today) and did live vivesections on prisoners, amputating their appendages until there was nothing left. Hitler’s SS thought the atrocities so bad in China…

Actually, this isn't what the article is about at all, though I can see how you would go this direction from the title alone.

The article discusses academic labs as well as biotech companies openly hiring people from all over the world, and publishing their findings in journals. It talks about curing diseases, drug discovery, the lack of availability in China of some medications, and the career incentives for taking your biologist career to China. These are researchers publishing findings that everyone can read (modulo paywalls from some scientific publishers).

What this article is about: potentially taking a research job in China as a biologist (as a reader of Nature).

What this article is not about at all: shadowy military labs working on weapons.

Excerpt: "Just a decade ago, when China-born scientists with overseas experience began returning to the country, lured by their homeland’s fast growth and growing financial means, they found a drug industry dominated by generics. Undeterred, they got busy building the infrastructure for an industry capable of drug discovery and development, buoyed by substantial government support and a thriving economy."

Re: Biotech booms in China

#12

Post by devy »

Bucephalus355 wrote: post #3

This does not seem good. The world has never really reconciled the biological and chemical atrocities that went on in Asia during WWII and since, like they have in Europe. The Japanese used chemical gas attacks (munitions of unexploded gas are still found in China today) and did live vivesections on prisoners, amputating their appendages until there was nothing left. Hitler’s SS thought the atrocities so bad in China…

> The world has never really reconciled the biological and chemical atrocities that went on in Asia during WWII and since, like they have in Europe.

Correct, it hasn't reconciled because Japanese government never truly feel guilty for their war crimes and most of Japanese prime minister still goes to visit Yasukuni Shrine for war criminals (do you know of any shrine for Hitler that German prime ministers visit?) And then there are jerks like Toshio Motoya that openly claims Japanese WW2 war crimes and Nanking Massacre, comfort women were fabricated and selling his ridiculous book about his bullshit theories in every APA hotel room in Japan. In comparison, can you imagine any major hotel chain owner publicly claiming holocaust was fabricated?

> I doubt China has forgotten any of this, as they are expanding funding by several orders of magnitude into research on Japanese WWII atrocities.

Never forgotten never will, just like Jews will never holocaust and American will never forget Pearl Harbor and Japanese will never forget Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

But, what substantial evidence you can provide to support your concerns of China's biotech advancement for revenge atrocity? If none, then stop trolling and let go your cold war thinkings.

The Nature article is indeed a paid advertisement in Macmillan's 3rd party editorial section as it denoted on the top, but I don't see any problem using research funding and research freedom to lure more researchers working there on advancing bio-tech in China.

Re: Biotech booms in China

#13

Post by qiqing »

joe_the_user wrote: post #4

Well, it seems logical that biotech would boom in a country with less regulation than the US. At the same time, it seems like for biotech to have an explosion akin to the last fifty years explosion of computer technology, one would have to find a way to well and truly automate the processes involved. Last I looked, a vast amount of research is very much by hand, injecting drug into animal by hand, putting liquids in…

> Well, it seems logical that biotech would boom in a country with less regulation than the US.

Relevant excerpt: "Innovent is hunting for employees who have worked in countries such as the United States, where the drug industries are more mature and people have had greater experience of overseeing the development of innovative drugs (see ‘What recruiters want’). “Ten per cent of our team are from overseas,” says Yu. “Returnees have first-hand experience with how drugs are developed and regulated in the United States.” This type of foreign experience will become increasingly important. In July, China became a member of the International Council for Harmonisation of Technical Requirements for Pharmaceuticals for Human Use (ICH), signalling its intentions to mould its regulatory system in the shape of the ICH’s founding members: the United States, the European Union and Japan."

Re: Biotech booms in China

#14

Post by qiqing »

narrator wrote: post #8

A couple of years back there was a paralyzed guy who went to China and got stem cell injections and was able to walk again. He did an AMA on reddit and the whole thing was full of people gaslighting him that he wasn't really paralyzed, or it wasn't really permanent, or he wasn't really healed, etc. Then we did it in the U.S a couple years later and claimed we're the first. Gibson's observation that "The future is alr…

Do you have the link by any chance? This doesn't surprise me at all since there's a vicious cycle of China-bashing-gets-eyeballs leads to random-trolls-enjoy-China-bashing.

Some of the worst trolls just love harassing founders (esp. female founders) with 10-things-I-hate-about-China to derail conversations about their startup or their product or their journey to product-market-fit.

Re: Biotech booms in China

#15

Post by qiqing »

adventured wrote: post #5
jostmey wrote: post #2

Here's something to add to the discussion. China was the first nation to approve a gene therapy for use in Humans. I don't know if it is effective or not. https://www.nature.com/articles/nbt0104-3 (over a decade old)

The same reason they're the first to work with CRISPR in humans, despite the US having a formerly vast R&D lead. It's because they're fundamentally a lot less concerned about killing people in the process. There's a reasonable debate to be had on whether the US is too concerned with the risk aspect of making progress on biotech.

> fundamentally a lot less concerned about killing people in the process

That's rather flippant, and I'd like to provide a counterpoint. Some neuroscience researchers held a town hall discussion in a major US city and also in a major Chinese city (on two different occasions) about bioethics, and one of the topics discussed was whether it was morally right or wrong (in the case of IVF) to screen for IQ, assuming we had reliable markers. So, same parents, no edits, but out of N embryos, instead of randomly selecting one, you choose one that's likely to be the smartest. Assuming it works reliably, is that wrong?

The U.S. audience was split approx. 50/50, with most of the objections about how it was going against God's will, or that it was "unnatural." The Chinese audience was all for it, and expressed surprise that the U.S. audience was split. Because if you could, and the technique was reliable, why wouldn't you?

Sometimes, it's useful to take a second look at our cultural biases.

Re: Biotech booms in China

#16

Post by CandidlyFake »

joe_the_user wrote: post #4

Well, it seems logical that biotech would boom in a country with less regulation than the US. At the same time, it seems like for biotech to have an explosion akin to the last fifty years explosion of computer technology, one would have to find a way to well and truly automate the processes involved. Last I looked, a vast amount of research is very much by hand, injecting drug into animal by hand, putting liquids in…

> Well, it seems logical that biotech would boom in a country with less regulation than the US.

If that was the case, biotech would be booming from the congo to nepal.

Biotech is booming in china because they have the resources ( money, people and infrastructure ).

Re: Biotech booms in China

#17

Post by justinjlynn »

qiqing wrote: post #14
narrator wrote: post #8

A couple of years back there was a paralyzed guy who went to China and got stem cell injections and was able to walk again. He did an AMA on reddit and the whole thing was full of people gaslighting him that he wasn't really paralyzed, or it wasn't really permanent, or he wasn't really healed, etc. Then we did it in the U.S a couple years later and claimed we're the first. Gibson's observation that "The future is alr…

Do you have the link by any chance? This doesn't surprise me at all since there's a vicious cycle of China-bashing-gets-eyeballs leads to random-trolls-enjoy-China-bashing. Some of the worst trolls just love harassing founders (esp. female founders) with 10-things-I-hate-about-China to derail conversations about their startup or their product or their journey to product-market-fit.

Unfortunately, some founders will then see any valid criticism of their methods and/or business practices and frame it as China-bashing. It's bad for everyone, including investors and the world at large, and I really wish the racist nonsense would stop.

Re: Biotech booms in China

#18

Post by qiqing »

justinjlynn wrote: post #17
qiqing wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have the link by any chance? This doesn't surprise me at all since there's a vicious cycle of China-bashing-gets-eyeballs leads to random-trolls-enjoy-China-bashing. Some of the worst trolls just love harassing founders (esp. female founders) with 10-things-I-hate-about-China to derail conversations about their startup or their product or their journey to product-market-fit.

Unfortunately, some founders will then see any valid criticism of their methods and/or business practices and frame it as China-bashing. It's bad for everyone, including investors and the world at large, and I really wish the racist nonsense would stop.

One of the privileges of being a U.S.-based founder is internationally, no one asks you to answer for the actions of Uber, Exxon, or pharma bro as though all companies in the U.S. came from one homogenous mass.

I'm not talking about criticisms of a particular company when it's the one being discussed. Should Theranos be criticized for their own failings? Yes. Should every U.S. startup be suspected of being similar because of another company's actions because in a population of 300M, someone else did a thing? You tell me...

Re: Biotech booms in China

#19

Post by stevenwoo »

qiqing wrote: post #15
adventured wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The same reason they're the first to work with CRISPR in humans, despite the US having a formerly vast R&D lead. It's because they're fundamentally a lot less concerned about killing people in the process. There's a reasonable debate to be had on whether the US is too concerned with the risk aspect of making progress on biotech.

> fundamentally a lot less concerned about killing people in the process That's rather flippant, and I'd like to provide a counterpoint. Some neuroscience researchers held a town hall discussion in a major US city and also in a major Chinese city (on two different occasions) about bioethics, and one of the topics discussed was whether it was morally right or wrong (in the case of IVF) to screen for IQ, assuming we ha…

On the other hand, the accepted use of selective gender abortion (where the problem made the male/female ratio out of wack especially in rural areas IIRC) in China versus the controversialness of abortion being legal in the USA (re: the persistence of attempts to limit access but observing the minimal literal interpretation of Roe v. Wade) might explain a willingness to let people make choices in China over the USA. Where else are you going to read that!?

Re: Biotech booms in China

#20

Post by joe_the_user »

CandidlyFake wrote: post #16
joe_the_user wrote: post #4

Well, it seems logical that biotech would boom in a country with less regulation than the US. At the same time, it seems like for biotech to have an explosion akin to the last fifty years explosion of computer technology, one would have to find a way to well and truly automate the processes involved. Last I looked, a vast amount of research is very much by hand, injecting drug into animal by hand, putting liquids in…

> Well, it seems logical that biotech would boom in a country with less regulation than the US. If that was the case, biotech would be booming from the congo to nepal. Biotech is booming in china because they have the resources ( money, people and infrastructure ).

Come on, any comment like mine above has an implicit "all else being equal" in it. I didn't say that to describe some absolute formula but to contextualize my later remarks.
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