Posted on 11/03/2006 12:43:47 PM PST by kathsua
Medicines and other medical treatments can produce adverse side effects in some patients. The penicillin that could save me from a deadly infection would have killed my mother who was allergic to it.
Stem cells (adult and embryonic) which are being touted as possible treatment for various ailments have a dark side. They are the leading suspects as the source of cancer cells.
Some recent research indicates that with some cancers activation of what biologists call a "signaling pathway" named "hedgehog" has been found active in various cancers (esophagus, stomach, pancreas, basil cell carcinoma, a deadly lung cancer and the most common childhood brain cancer (medulloblastoma)).
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...1023070541.htm
Hedgehog plays a critical role in embryonic development. It determines the development of various different specialized cells and where they develop. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...1031132459.htm
In an embryo, the cells produce parts of the body rather than just specialized cells. In an adult body, this ability of individual embryonic cells to produce different daughter cells can cause problems. An embryonic cell in an embryo may produce muscle cells along with blood vessels to supply them. In an adult body this process of producing different cells could result in tumors.
I'm not sure that those who want to work with embryonic cells understand how these cells normally function. First, the DNA in a fertilized egg is initially in a compressed form. The DNA is expanded by insertion of sections what was once called "junk DNA" such as retrotransposons. Another process turns specific genes on or off.
Embryonic cells do not immediately become specialized cells. They produce areas of the body. Specialized cells come several generations down the line. The embryonic and fetal development processes must not only produce specialized cells, but the cells must be in exactly the right location. Development of a liver in the head or a brain in a foot would not produce a functional body. Thus the instructions the embryonic cells follow, must include information to properly locate specialized cells. Instead of individual embryonic cells producing isolated bone or muscle, etc. cells, a matriz of embryonic cells produce appropriately arranged bone, muscle, nerve, etc. cells.
Location within the matrix may determine which embryonic cells eventually become which specialized cells through chemical feedback from different cells.
Articifical development of separated embryonic cells hampers development of specialized cells at the proper stage and in the proper location because cells cannot get the proper chemical feedback from neighboring cells. Specialized cells produced by embryonic cells may not be fully mature in terms of the structure of the DNA and which genes are turned on or off. They may be more likely to become defective and produce tumors rather than the appropriate specialized cells. This does not mean that all embryonic cells will produce tumors, only that they will have a greater probability of producing tumors.
A potential problem with cancerous tumors is that the defective cells that eventually produce the tumors may acquire the defects several years before they begin producing the tumor. Much of the work with embryonic cells thus far has been in mice which don't live long enough to allow complete determination of the possibility of cancer ( although some tumors have been produced in rats/mice) Researchers wishing to treat humans with embryonic cells, should be required to first conduct extended studies with chimps or other apes to determine if there is an increased risk of cancer from embryonic cells.
I explained to one of my friends that I know people can fly. You have to just let me keep throwing enough people off the roof until I find the ones that ca.
If drug companies were able to develop embryonic stem cells they could PATENT THEM and hold rights.
Follow the money.
Because despite the outcome they still have a lot to learn. There are many drugs created that cause horrible complications (and never reach the public) but are still used by researchers in the hopes of finding cures or in hopes of greater knowledge.
The outcome is a "dead end" for small humans.
I was referring to the "outcome" of the research of the drug itself.
Here in MO, I have come to the conclusion that the embryonic stem cell amendment to the constitution is a last ditch effort by the pro-choice agenda to maintain its power.
They have lost their base, one by one, ever since roevwade.
I am voting NO on 2 because I do not want this to be a specific part of my taxes. Grants for research is one thing, but specifically embryonic stem cell smacks of planned parenthood.
Isn't embryonic stem cells only about cloning...
Why is this research continuing if there is a danger of cancer? I know that many products are kept off the market if they cause cancer in rats or mice. I have read that some rats developed tumors cancer after getting embryonic stem cells. So why is the research continuing?
So that John Danforth (the sermonizing former senator from Missouri)
can see his brother get rich (he's a lawyer in the biotech field).
Don't expect to hear that on TV.
bttt
The money for drug companies will come from adult stem cells -- specifically sale of drugs that encourage the patient's own stem cells to move to parts of the body that need repair.
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