They could have included Amyloidosis, the disease that killed my Dad in October. He was diagnosed too late. If we had known sooner, he could have gotten a bone marrow transplant using his own stem cells. They would have harvested them from his blood.
I bitterly resent every dime wasted on embryonic stem cell research. I hope to raise money to increase education and awareness of this awful disease so that fewer people will suffer like my Father did.
Thanks for posting this! It is so encouraging to hear of the many promising therapies being developed from adult stem cells. Best of all, there are no ethical or moral dilemmas...no one has to die so that another may live.
The last time they called, they told me of a new independent study they plan to have published that finds that the odds of being diagnosed within your lifetime of a disease currently treatable with cord blood stem cells is 1 out of 27. And that if cord blood proves successful in treating heart disease, that figure would jump to 1 out of 2.
Of course, while not all adult stem cells are alike, it's likely that much of this research could prove applicable to these other types of stem cells, too. This is important of course because not everyone has their cord blood banked (including me). But there really is no good reason not to have your children's cord blood banked today; it's a good insurance policy.
Ping ...
bttt
I'm a biology/philosophy student. I support stem cell research as long as it does not involve sacrificing a human life (i.e. embryonic). Underdeveloped human life is too precious for us to merely harvest a few cells to benefit a grown person. I think that it would be more beneficial to use one's own stem cells to procreate certain tissues. This way, there is less risk of rejection when, say, a diabetic individual recieves pancreatic tissue that contains his/her own genome and cellular protein receptors. Adult stem cells tend to 'behave' better than embryonic ones- they do not replicate as fast and respond better to inhibiting factors. Embryonic stem cells replicate as fast as they possibly can, and often don't respond to competitive inhibition. In a sense they have the potential to act like tumor cells. This is how adult stem cells, and even some umbilical cells, are more beneficial and even more ethical to use. I think it is great that we are improving lives of those who have congenital disease; however, we must maintain a human approach, and not pretend to be God.
ping for the current topic, and this one:
Sweet cell of success
(Major breakthrough in adult stem cell research could end ethical debate)
The Australian | March 22, 2005 | Wayne Smith
Posted on 03/21/2005 7:51:51 AM PST by dead
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1367196/posts
I wrote an extensive paper on this for a class I had last semester. My research led to the same conclusions as this writer's. ASC research is far more advanced and offers far more promise than ESC. We should focus our efforts in what we know works.
This thread is worth a bump.
On Sunday I worked for Wisconsin Right to Life at a local "street fair" handing out flyers that detail some of this information to the public for a couple of ours. the lady that worked with me had a good idea because there is so much misinformation out there -- thanks to poor and biased news coverage.
As pro-lifers, we should demand at every opportunity -- Letters to the Editor, emails to the media and to the legislature -- that every time stem cell research is mentioned, the the spokesperson should be required to differentiate which kind they are talking about -- embryonic, or adult stem cell. If we just keep pounding this idea, perhaps the message will get through that there is a difference.