Um, hate to argue, but it's more about the glory of lab scientists than anything else. I work around the group that is pushing the embryonic side of things in my state and population control is never any part of their argument. State funding, yes, to keep the labs running because there are fewer funders now than there were even 20 years ago. The word "hope" has been adopted, but as embryonic stem cell research is in its sixth decade with zero tangible positive results, it's become a race to prove critics wrong and the Nobel prize that will go to the person who gets it to work. There are serious doubts that it will ever happen, but they don't want to hear it.
Nah. I think the lab scientists are just an extra extremity that grew out of the side of it. It's an excuse ( support population control and eternal health will be yours ), but, I agree that to the scientists - it is an extremely lucrative challenge.