Popularity Increases for Indian Cord Blood Banks

North America isn't the only country in which cord blood banking has become popular in recent years. Overseas, in India, more and more parents are becoming interested in privately banking their child's cord blood, The Hindu reports.

Reporter M. Sai Gopal spoke with Abhaya Mayur of Lifecell International, India's first family cord blood bank to gain an understanding of the biosciences industry in the country. According to Mayur, his bank has already stored over 1000 samples from parents across India in just one year. This is likely to be the highest number of cord blood collections per year for Lifecell International.

Mayur states that many parents are skeptical about cord blood banking, and are concerned about spending money without having a history of illness in their famlies. He believes that cord blood technology is advancing at a rapid rate, and that the technology may be used to treat an even wider range of diseases in the near future. As such, the chances that any family will need a cord blood transplant will increase in coming years.

"There is a potential to treat 80 types of ailments and technology is evolving faster than one can imagine", he says.

Mayur expects that cord blood banking will continue to grow in popularity over the next few years and hopes that even more parents will discover the benefits of cord blood banking.