{"id":47,"date":"2020-01-06T23:16:10","date_gmt":"2020-01-06T23:16:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/biohackbase.com\/index.php\/2020\/01\/06\/the-biohacking-company-testing-drugs-on-itself-hbo\/"},"modified":"2020-01-06T23:16:10","modified_gmt":"2020-01-06T23:16:10","slug":"the-biohacking-company-testing-drugs-on-itself-hbo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/biohackbase.com\/index.php\/2020\/01\/06\/the-biohacking-company-testing-drugs-on-itself-hbo\/","title":{"rendered":"The Biohacking Company Testing Drugs On Itself (HBO)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\"  width=\"580\" height=\"385\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/5JiNedvN4U8\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><br \/>\n<br \/>On October 17, 2017, Tristan Roberts, an activist and software engineer, injected himself with a chemical solution that he hoped would modify his genetic code to cure him of his HIV \u2014 and he live-streamed the entire thing on Facebook.<\/p>\n<p>The gene therapy Roberts self-administered was not approved by the FDA: It was an experimental compound developed by a tiny startup called Ascendance Biomedical.<\/p>\n<p>Roberts\u2019s public self-experiment drew a new wave of attention to the practice of biohacking, an ill-defined term that means, in essence, biological research conducted outside of institutions like universities and pharmaceutical companies.<\/p>\n<p>Ascendance Biomedical&#8217;s business model is based on a regulatory loophole: While it\u2019s illegal to market something as medicine if it hasn\u2019t been approved by the FDA, chemical research compounds, typically for use in science experiments, are openly bought and sold all the time \u2014 and, legally speaking, people are free to make the individual decision to test them on themselves.<\/p>\n<p>But, like any other startup, Ascendance Biomedical is plagued by infighting, and their philosophical divisions reveal a deeper rift in the biohacking community: While some biohackers are motivated by a desire to subvert a drug approval process they believe has been corrupted by big pharma and the profit motive, others are simply entrepreneurs at heart<\/p>\n<p>Subscribe to VICE News here: <a href=\"http:\/\/bit.ly\/Subscribe-to-VICE-News\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">http:\/\/bit.ly\/Subscribe-to-VICE-News<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Check out VICE News for more: <a href=\"http:\/\/vicenews.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">http:\/\/vicenews.com<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Follow VICE News here:<br \/>\nFacebook: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/vicenews\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/vicenews<\/a><br \/>\nTwitter: <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/vicenews\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/twitter.com\/vicenews<\/a><br \/>\nTumblr: <a href=\"http:\/\/vicenews.tumblr.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">http:\/\/vicenews.tumblr.com\/<\/a><br \/>\nInstagram: <a href=\"http:\/\/instagram.com\/vicenews\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">http:\/\/instagram.com\/vicenews<\/a><br \/>\nMore videos from the VICE network: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.fb.com\/vicevideo\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/www.fb.com\/vicevideo<\/a><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=5JiNedvN4U8\">source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On October 17, 2017, Tristan Roberts, an activist and software engineer, injected himself with a chemical solution that he hoped<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":48,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[8,6,5,4,10,11,9,7],"class_list":["post-47","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-bio-hacking-bio-engineering-videos","tag-bio-hack","tag-bioengineering","tag-biohacker","tag-biohacking","tag-biohacking-crispr","tag-biohacking-diet","tag-biohacking-kit","tag-biological-engineering"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/biohackbase.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/biohackbase.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/biohackbase.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biohackbase.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biohackbase.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/biohackbase.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biohackbase.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/biohackbase.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biohackbase.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/biohackbase.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}