In view of the family's recalcitrance, the hospital then made a legal application for a guardian to make medical decisions about the "best interests" of Mrs Sharoubim. In the opinion of Monash kidney specialist Associate Professor Peter Kerr, this means withdrawal of treatment. Death would result within days or weeks. Dr Kerr told The Age that this opinion was based solely on the woman's overall condition and not on available resources, as his unit had enough facilities and there were no restrictions on funding. Mrs Sharoubim appears to be distressed by the treatment and has pulled out her needles during dialysis several times in recent weeks.

Her son, however, contends that money was a factor. One staff member had told him that the hospital bed cost a lot of money and doctors wanted his mother out. "One member of staff said, don't take this personally, it happens on a regular basis," he said. According to an unnamed medical specialist, many hospitals try to stop continuing dialysis treatment once a patient needs a nursing home.

Twenty years ago the NIH was described as "an island of objective and pristine research, untainted by the influences of commercialisation". This is no longer true, says the Times. Even worse, the NIH allows its employees to keep much of their outside income hidden from public view. A former editor of the New England Journal of Medicine, Dr Arnold S. Relman, says that private consulting by government scientists poses "legitimate cause for concern".

"This [type of approach] has the potential to make stem cell research more practical," says one of the researchers, Dr Sheng Ding. "This will allow you to derive stem-like cells from your own mature cells, avoiding the technical and ethical issues associated with embryonic stem cells."