Table 1 Italian courts’ decisions regarding stem cell-based therapies
Court | Disabling disease | Legal reasoning ruled |
|---|---|---|
Court of Justice, Venice 2012 | Spinal muscular atrophy (SMA1) | The Tribunal accepted to provide stem cell-based therapies, highlighting that they are not experimental drugs. The use of them is allowed by the Italian decree, called Turco-Fazio 2006. |
Court of Justice, Matera 2012 | Niemann-Pick syndrome | The Tribunal accepted to provide stem cell-based therapies, operating a counterbalance of opposite health interests: the right to individual and the right to public health. The absence of efficacious alternative therapies justify the individual right to health as the prevailing interest to protect. |
Court of Justice, Crotone 2013 | Niemann-Pick syndrome | The Tribunal accepted to provide stem cell-based therapies. When the case is urgent and exceptional, the protection of life and health must be strengthened and addressed toward a compassionate and personalized point of view. |
Court of Justice, Trento 2012 | Spinal muscular atrophy (SMA1) | The Tribunal accepted to provide stem cell-based therapies. To deny the stem cell-based therapy in a case that does not have alternatives therapies may jeopardize the right to life and the right to health, determining a possible loss of survival and quality life improvement chances. This might also limit the technological progress in the field of the medical science. |
Court of Justice, Rome 2012 | Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis | The Tribunal did not accept to provide Stamina’s stem cell-based therapies. The patient’s health is not sufficiently protected. |
Court of Justice, Firenze 2012 | Metachromatic leukodystrophy | The Tribunal did not accept to provide Stamina’s stem cell-based therapies. The patient’s health is not sufficiently protected. The absence of scientific data regarding stem cell-based therapies prevent considering treatment safe and useful. |