The In Depth 60 Minutes, an investigative journalism program broadcast by KBS, featured an interview with Prof. Howard Lee on August 16, 2019 with respect the recent Invossa debacle. Invossa is a gene and cell therapy approved to treat patients with osteoarthritis of the knee. Invossa was claimed to contain genetically transformed chondrocytes, which turned out not to be the case. Instead, they were cells originated from the human embryonic kidney, which could cause cancer to develop in those who received Invossa. Invossa has been administered to more than 3,000 patients only in Korea. The Korea Ministry of Food and Drug Safety (MFDS) revoked the marketing approval of Invossa, and promised to initiate a nationwide pharmacovigilance program to investigate the safety impact of Invossa, which though has not been in effect yet. 

In the show, Prof. Lee emphasized why misbranding or mislabelling is a significant health harm, which can be legally penalized. Furthermore, he explained why MFDS was not able to detect what went wrong in the case of approval of Invossa. Prof. Lee added, "Although MFDS has been trying to renovate themselves over the past decade or so, it still lacks the expertise and manpower required to adequately review the safety and efficacy of the drug, particularly advanced therapies such as Invossa." Prof. Lee was featured in a total of four clips. 

The full program can be watched by clicking here.