The 40 million dollar placenta — Francis Aguisanda

Well, more like placentas. Last year, the National Institutes of Health announced that it was embarking on a new research program studying the placenta. Today, it also announced that $41.5 million would be earmarked for research projects within the program. The policy wonks reading this are probably thinking who the hell would pay so much taxpayer money learning about the placenta? Don't we have better things to research? As with most things within biomedical research, the true value that research brings needs to evaluated with your critical thinking caps on! *I was going to put a picture of a placenta here, but I refrained from doing so for the sake of my readers with sensitive stomachs!*

The placenta, according to the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development, is one of the least understood organs. You're probably aware of its vital role for the fetus: it allows the fetus to feed, remove waste, and receive gases critical to normal growth. We normally look at the placenta indirectly via ultrasound and blood tests, and we can also examine the tissue after birth has occurred. How the placenta changes throughout pregnancy is still a bit of a mystery, so by investing research in this area the NIH hopes to glean new information of how the cells grow and adapt to support the developing fetus.

Why is this important? As I've stated above, the placenta is critical in maintaining the health of the child, so if anything were to go wrong in proper placental development it could lead to potentially life-threatening conditions in the womb. These conditions, including gestational diabetes and preeclampsia (high blood pressure during pregnancy) can lead to miscarriages or premature deliveries. A greater understanding of this critical organ will hopefully gives us the ability to better prevent these tragedies from occurring in the future.