hello all, you may want to research more on cord blood banking before making a decision. Cordlife and Stemcord are both for-profit commercial banks and just base on their information alone, you will not get the full picture.
In many developed countries including USA and UK, commercial cord blood banking as a form of biological insurance is discouraged. In countries like Italy and Spain, it's actually banned!
European Commission's Group on Ethics in Science and New Technologies (EGE) report on the ethics of private umbilical cord banking:
"The legitimacy of commercial cord blood banks for autologous use should be questioned as they sell a service, which has presently, no real use regarding therapeutic options. Thus they promise more than they can deliver. The activities of such banks raise serious ethical criticisms."
American Academy of Pediatrics:
"Cord blood donation should be discouraged when cord blood stored in a bank is to be directed for later personal or family use, because most conditions that might be helped by cord blood stem cells already exist in the infant's cord blood (ie, premalignant changes in stem cells). Physicians should be aware of the unsubstantiated claims of private cord blood banks that promise to insure infants or family members against serious illnesses in the future by use of the stem cells contained in cord blood".
"Given the difficulty of making an accurate estimate of the need for autologous transplantation and the ready availability of allogeneic transplantation, private storage of cord blood, as biological insurance, is unwise."
Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists:
"The RCOG strongly supports the concept of a NHS Cord Blood Bank for allogeneic storage of donated cord blood and would like to see it well funded. However, it remains unconvinced of the benefit of personal commercial banking for low-risk families."
World Marrow Donor Association: Policy Statement for the Utility of Autologous or Family Cord Blood Unit Storage:
"Today the likelihood that an autologous cord blood unit will be used for transplantation is very low. There is currently no clear proof that these cells will be able to be used for regenerative medicine or to treat other diseases in the future."
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All you have to do is google Cord Blood Banking: Private Vs Public Banking, and you'll find more information that'll give you a more balanced perspective on cord blood banking.
There is only one instance where it makes sense to bank your baby's cord blood privately, and that's if a sibling or someone in the family who may benefit from stem cell transplant. Other than that, you're better off saving the money for traditional medical insurance and donating your baby's cord blood to a public bank.
Read this Straits Times article:
http://www.scbb.com.sg/images/newsarticles/2008/october/ST_25Oct2008.pdf