[OPINION] Embryo cloning claptrap - is there no limit to public gullibility?

It is one of the unhappier jobs of a doctor to tell a patient she is a victim of false hope. But somebody has to do it, and guide her back to reality and any genuine hope for treatment.

We have read of the Brisbane woman who flew to India to receive injections of "embryonic stem cells" into her spinal injury.

To any medically trained person, this story carries the highest suspicion of fraud. Nowhere in the world has an embryonic stem cell ever been injected into a human, for the very serious reason that they cause tumours when injected into animals. Yet some obscure Indian doctor, whose work is not only inherently absurd - claiming to treat Alzheimer's, which is the very litmus test of stem cell absurdity - and which breaks the cardinal rule of medical research - that experimental treatment must be judged by medical peers before being used on humans - is treated with seriousness by our media.

If only the media could show judgment in what they get excited about. Yes, the first published trial...