A little more about the early days of Hemopure:
In this article published in the New York Times in 1990, was noticed that Biopure announced with some fanfare that the first safety human trials had been conducted in Guatemala.
"the researchers said the trials, conducted at a medical center in Guatemala City, showed only that the product is safe for use in humans".
However the the NYT journalist noticed a couple of oddities with this announcement:
"The results were presented in a highly unorthodox setting, at a conference sponsored by the Guatemalan mission to the United Nations in New York. The aim of the announcement seemed to be more an appeal by the Guatemalan researchers for assistance with the next phase of the trials than a formal presentation of scientific results."
The NYT reporter also pointed out sharply that little hard data was provided to back up the announcement:
"Indeed, the researchers offered almost no hard data to support their claims that the new product was completely safe. ''We are preparing that data for publication,'' said Dr. Rudolf Garcia-Gallont, the doctor in charge of the testing. ''We are still in the process of putting it all together.''
The NYT reporter also hinted what seemed to be the point of this largely unsubstantiated press conference: Public Relations, namely to put pressure on the american FDA to give the go-ahead permission to conduct human trials in the US.
Eden