Note the source of the graphical aid. At least the article makes some mention of the ethical issues involved. The article made no mention of therapeutic cloning that I remember. The products of conception just happen.
Posted on 07/29/2004 8:13:29 PM PDT by neverdem
SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH
When Ron Reagan gave his speech on stem cell research before the Democratic National Convention on Tuesday night, medical researchers were taking careful note. It was just so important to them that he get the details right, that he make no mistakes on the science and that they glean any tricks they could on how to get their message about the importance of stem cell research across.
But for all the promise, and for all the fervent hopes of patients and their families that cures from stem cells will come soon, researchers say many questions in basic science remain to be answered. And experts with ethical objections to the destruction of human embryos for such research say they oppose paying for the work with public money. Scientists know the emotional, and ethical, sides in the stem cell debate. The cells are from human embryos.
Many scientists hope eventually to make customized stem cells for patients by starting the cloning process, making an embryo that is genetically identical to the patient, but interrupting the clone's development when it was a few days old and extracting its stem cells. Such research can be an ethical tinderbox, they realize. They also feel frustrated and hobbled by the current restrictions on research with human embryonic stem cells. If they want federal money, scientists must agree to use only cells derived from embryos dating from before Aug. 9, 2001. Many hope for a real policy change.
So leading scientists say they go around the country speaking at churches and synagogues, in community gatherings and at medical centers, hoping to explain stem cell research and its promise. And they anticipated Mr. Reagan's speech with shivers of thrill and anticipation. They knew that any misstep, any exaggeration, any error by someone as prominent as Ron Reagan, the former president's son, could end up hurting their cause.
But the speech, said Dr. John Gearhart, director of the stem cell program at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, was all he could have wished. "I certainly thought it was passionate," he said. Yet, he added, it also was accurate. "I think he did a good job," Dr. Gearhart said.
Mr. Reagan spoke of the stem cells as simply cells, with a potential to cure disease. "They are not, in and of themselves, human beings," he said.
He also spoke of a girl with diabetes, who put sequins on her insulin pump. She "has learned to sleep through the blood drawings in the wee hours of the morning,'' and she knows what her future might hold - "blindness, amputation, diabetic coma."
He pleaded, "I urge you, please, cast a vote for embryonic stem cell research."
The idea of stem cell research is to take embryo cells that have the potential to become any type of cell, be it liver, heart, nerve, pancreas or blood, and grow them in petri dishes, adding chemicals to turn them into replacement cells to cure disease. A person with diabetes, for example, would get pancreas cells to replace ones that have died. Someone with Parkinson's disease would get replacement brain cells.
Researchers, however, have not yet cured any disease or even routinely turned embryo cells into specific adult cells. They got furthest in mice, where they converted mouse stem cells into brain cells like those lost in Parkinson's and into blood cells.
Dr. Ronald McKay, a stem cell researcher at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke, counseled patience.
"We are essentially getting cells to differentiate without the rest of the embryo," Dr. McKay said. "That has to be controlled and it has to be controlled in the lab. It's tricky stuff and it will take quite a while to figure out."
"The problem is that everyone is looking for magic," Dr. McKay said. "Academics are too."
But, he said, to get to the next stage, when animals can routinely be cured of some diseases, like diabetes or Parkinson's, "is likely going to take a new wave of technology or experiments."
Yet, said Dr. Leonard Zon, a stem cell expert at Harvard Medical School, research is advancing rapidly, and in directions that can have even more impact than creating replacement cells.
Everyone wants to help patients, said Dr. John Kilner, an ethicist who directs the Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity. The question, however, is, At what ethical cost?
"The core ethical problem is that this research requires destroying human beings at the embryonic stage," he said. "It is a human embryo, it is not dirt or soil or some other materials and it is not just some cells. There are so many examples in history where people say, 'As long as we can convince ourselves that these beings are not fully persons then what we want to do is O.K.' "
He sees the questions as "an end-means thing." Proponents of the research are holding up lofty goals and dismissing the means to achieve them. Dr. Kilner says there are many who share his ethical qualms.
"We're talking about federal support here,'' he said. "It is inappropriate to require the entire populace to support something that a significant proportion considers to be such an ethical violation."
Dr. Zon disagrees. "As long as the issues are openly discussed and peoples' ethics are examined, why shouldn't we pursue this avenue of research?" he said.
He joins the scientists who are grateful to Ron Reagan.
"What's good about what Ron did is that he opened this debate up to the American public. He showed them what might be the future and asked them to think about it."
Note the source of the graphical aid. At least the article makes some mention of the ethical issues involved. The article made no mention of therapeutic cloning that I remember. The products of conception just happen.
ping
ping
Bump!
Bush does not ban stem cell research, he restricts federal funding for it.
Now if stem cell research is so promising, and can cure all these diseases in good time, wouldn't that mean the pharmaceutical industry would be investing like crazy in it?
Think about this, the amount of money they could make if this stuff works out even half as good as people hope.
But these companies don't pour money into research do they? No, why? Because they know that its a pie in sky like fetal tissue research was. Its not a moral issue to them, its a financial issue, that silence you hear, is the true feelings about those who would have the most to gain if this would work.
The Dems current fascination with stem cells ultimately has nothing to do with stem cells and whether they have any promise or not. Most of them could care less one way or the other about that. The issue is abortion. Abortion, abortion, abortion. They think that if they can get the public to accept the creation (and destruction) of embryos for this purpose, then all the opposition to abortion will cease too.
A lousy article, but hey it's the NY Slimes.
They don't tell you that stem cells don't just come from embryos!
Adult stem cells have been used for years to cure diseases, even grow new heart muscle. (did you know that bone marrow is essentially blood in stem cell form?) Embryonic stem cell experiments in animals have a high rate of bad side-effects, like tumors and cancer.
This article, The Stem Cell Cover-Up, written well before Ron's speech, blows his arguments out of the water. Please check it out and challenge Ron with some SCIENTIFICFACTS.
http://www.insightmag.com/news/2004/05/16/National/The-Stem.Cell.CoverUp-682587.shtml
Many of the people pushing stem cell research are in the biotech field and would profit from more federal funding, because they are having a hard time finding private investors. Can you say VESTED INTEREST?
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,43880,00.html
The comment about candidate positions OMITS that President Bush fully supports and encourages stem cell research that does not use embryonic or fetal cells, other than the ones already in existence. And EVERY therapeutic use of stem cells that actually benefited a patient came from sources that are fully supported by the President.
ping
So how is this different from what the Red Chinese are doing with harvesting transplant organs from condemned prisoners?
What the Chicoms are doing in sacrificing human lives for treatment of others is actually more ethical. Organ transplants are therapeutically proven. But there are no stem cell cures. So this is sacrificing human lives in the hope of eventually finding cures that require more sacrificing of human lives.
Here is your Science Komrad Kerry.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Ron Reagan Jr. seemed to be at odds with his father his whole life, but is now concerned about stem cell research, reportedly regarding how it could lead to treating people afflicted with Alzheimer's disease....
Ronald Reagan was pro-life, and although the stem cell research controversy was not part of his political arena, I think he would have been against harvesting unborn fetus tissue for this research.
I think that Ron Jr.'s appearance at the DNC convention was just one more slap in the old man's face.
It's so sad that one of the greatest leaders of this country has such sorry progeny as Ron Jr. and Patty. What happened?
Stem cell research from "harvested embryos" is a political issue. You can get stem cells from umbilical cords at birth, and it should be standard starting ASAP. It is the abortion maniacs that want to tout every possible way to sanctify abortion. Embryonic stem cells are not needed in any case.
http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2002/10/22/151156.shtml
DK
One of the barely mentioned significant parts.
They're perfectly free to do all this with their own money, corporate money, or even other private money.
If it's such a boon, why aren't the giant pharmaceuticals doing just that. They'll get rich!
But none of them are touching it.
The Dems current fascination with stem cells ultimately has nothing to do with stem cells and whether they have any promise or not. Most of them could care less one way or the other about that. The issue is abortion. Abortion, abortion, abortion. They think that if they can get the public to accept the creation (and destruction) of embryos for this purpose, then all the opposition to abortion will cease too.That's all there is to it. You've nailed the propaganda lizard on the head.
You wrote:
"The first step -- as the article says above -- is to see if animal embryonic stem cells can cure animal versions of human diseases. (PETA be damned)
"If they can not do it in animals, there is no need to even get near the human embryonic stem cell issue. There is NO barrier to federal funding of adult stem cell research."
...
Absolutely. There should be exactly ZERO interest in human experimentation using this questionable "technology" right now. Imagine how people would howl if a new sunscreen created from noxious chemicals were smeared on a child before it had been tested and proven safe for animals!
The time for these battles to be fought is well in the future. In the mean time, let's find out just how important it is that the cells be "embryonic", and whether it can be safely applied for the patient. We already know how it affects the embryo.
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I am still getting yur mass posts. Please check again for my name and remove it. Thanks.
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