Cord Blood

So I've been reading up on this option they're offering new parents for when your child is born. When they cut the umbilical cord, they save the blood and thus the stem cells. Then, for a mere $2000 they put them in frozen storage for the day when your child (or apparently even you) gets some terrible disease. And of course, there's a yearly fee to keep the ice cold. People can even donate their baby's cords if they don't want or need them to, I dunno, poor people with the similar blood types?

My question now becomes: Am I being guilted into technology that isn't really off the ground yet? I mean, how dare I not do this, right? Because, what if...? Our child could have leukemia or something and some smug prick in a white coat will say, "If only you saved the cord blood." I can almost hear my future child wheezing, "Daddy, dying hurts. If only you weren't such a cheap bastard." This kind of thing really plays into the laundry list of ever-present new parent worries. You want to protect them. You want them to be healthy. I think in the future, we'll all grow our children in a bio-box under our bedside table. It'll look like a mini-fridge.

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Designer babies are not far off. Rent Gattaca.

Last time I checked, Bush said that he wouldn't spend Federal money on stem cell research that involves new lines and supplies. Old lines only. As if I need another reason to hate this guy. So I guess we roll the dice, make some room on our credit cards, and hope that if something does happen the research and technology has had some time to be more than experimental.