CELLING LIES (Stem Cell Myths exposed by Michael Fumento)

National Review ^ | September 25th, 2002 | Michael Fumento

[Sabertooth]

"Promise of Adult Stem Cells Put in Doubt," proclaimed UPI. "Study Deals Blow to Abilities of Adult Stem Cells," declared Scientific American in its online publication. "Study Finds Adult Blood Stem Cells Will Not Transform into Other Tissue Cells," insisted the Associated Press.

The fuss concerns an article in the highly respected journal Science detailing efforts of Stanford researchers to trace the development of blood stem cells after placing them into mice whose bone marrow had been destroyed. They reported that blood stem cells replenished marrow but appeared worthless for creating other tissues.

"Blood-forming stem cells from adults make blood," primary researcher Irving Weissman insisted to UPI. "They don't make brain; they don't make heart muscle or any of these things."

Such smugness from a scientist who should know a single study never proves anything. As it happens, a report published in Nature Medicine in November 2000 showed that such cells when injected into mice rebuilt liver tissue. A minor co-author of the piece was named Irving Weissman.

Weissman's sureness was just for show.

Indeed, "The Stanford paper is the one at odds with the bulk of the published literature," Indiana State University biologist David Prentice told me.

While nobody knows yet just how capable non-embryonic stem cells will prove, we know they will be extremely useful because they have been.

Ever hear of bone marrow or umbilical-cord-blood transplants? It's the stem cells in the marrow and blood that makes them work. They've been used therapeutically since the 1980s and now some 70 different diseases, primarily forms of leukemia, are treated with them.

True, these comprise direct infusions rather than the next step of "reprogramming" the stem cells outside the body to make them into various types of mature cells.

But there's tremendous progress here, too. As of last year, over 30 different anti-cancer applications alone involving non-embryonic stem cell therapies on humans had been reported in peer-reviewed medical literature. Over 100 non-embryonic-stem-cell experiments in animals have shown success against a vast array of diseases.

The very newspapers that now pooh-pooh adult stem cells were only days earlier reporting on the almost-miraculous cure of a Dutch child afflicted with "bubble boy syndrome." His immune system was worthless. But it was restored when stem cells from his marrow were removed, cultured, and injected back into him.

Even if blood stem cells were worthless for tissue, we'd still have other types of stem cells that have been cultivated not just from marrow and umbilical cords but also from placentas, amniotic fluid, skin, brains, spinal cords, dental pulp, muscles, blood vessels, corneas, retinas, livers, pancreases, hair follicles, and even liposuctioned fat.

Catherine Verfaillie and her co-workers at the University of Minnesota's Stem Cell Institute recently published a report in Science's main competitor, Nature, suggesting that a certain type of marrow stem cells may give rise to almost any type of tissue in the body. They have isolated them from the marrow of mice, rats and people and so far have transformed them into cells of blood, the gut, liver, lung, brain, and other organs.

Yet time and again a single study like the Stanford one is shoved forward to show that non-embryonic-stem-cell therapy is the biological version of cold fusion. Why?

Some of the media coverage may reflect sheer ignorance. But Science and Weissman know better. They're both part of a deliberate disinformation campaign by those who see embryonic stem cell research and non-embryonic stem cell research locked in mortal combat.

The worse the non-embryonics look, the stronger the case for using embryonic stem cells. With every breakthrough in non-embryonic research comes the need to turn up the screech knob on the disinformation box.

That's because while the government can make grants on a whim, venture capital flows towards success. Thus almost all capital is going to non-embryonic research. Those working with embryonic cells are desperate for government funds.

It's hardly surprising, therefore, that Dr. Michael D. West, head of Advanced Cell Technology in Worcester, Mass., told the AP that the Stanford study indicates "stem cells from the bone marrow will not be a practical source for many cell types needed" to treat disease. That is, it wouldn't be surprising if the AP had told you West's company does research with embryonic stem cells.

Just as a 30-year-old panhandler will claim to be a Vietnam vet to shake money out of your pockets, those desperate for funding are obviously not above misrepresenting research to keep their labs running.

But whatever the promises of embryonic research, the actual applications are coming from non-embryonic stem cells. The miracles they have already performed are but little compared to those of which they are capable. We dare not let that progress be hamstrung by the politics of pork.

— Michael Fumento is a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute in Washington, D.C. where he's currently writing BioEvolution: How Biotechnology is Changing our World.

[Sabertooth]

Michael Fumento was correct in exposing The Myth of Heterosexual AIDS in 1993, and he is correct in exposing the myths of fetal stem cell research in the 21st Century.

President Bush got bad advice in his decision to fund research on some limited number of fetal stem cell lines. Umbilical stem cell lines are especially promising, and (unless the day arrives when abortions outpace liive births) will always be more plentiful than fetal lines. But as with AIDS research, politics and money are distorting the true picture.

If he was going to fund stem cell research at all, rather than trying to please everyone with funding for a finite number of fetal stem cell lines, President Bush should have opted for stem cells from less morally problematic sources, like umbilical cords.

Let's put the debate in terms that has the Democrats fighting for harvesting death via abortions vs. the Republicans harvesting life through discarded umbilical cords at birth.

Is there a problem with framing the issue in such a way that the GOP gets all of the benefits and credit, with the added bonus that it spills over into other issues to our advantage as well?

[Mo1]

WIPE THE SMILE OFF OF THIS MAN'S FACE.

VOTE THE RATS OUT!!

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[Sabertooth]

((((((growl)))))

[Torie]

The author admits that the potentiality of embryonic stem cells is unknown. The focus of the article is on government funding. Maybe most of it should be directed to adult cells. But the controversy was about whether to let private researchers have access to them more than about funding. Case closed as to whether we can be reasonably certain that denying the use of embryonic stem cells presents no potential impairment of medical research. Wew can't.

[Sabertooth]

Case closed as to whether we can be reasonably certain that denying the use of embryonic stem cells presents no potential impairment of medical research. We can't.

But that's a selective misrepresentation of the case.

All manner of scientific research that relies on harvesting human test subjects may have medical utility, that doesn't mean that they should be pursued with no regard for morality or ethics.

And it is the question of morality and ethics that makes funding of fetal stem cells politically problematic.

Although you've already seen this, I'll repost it for others:

For the first time, the researchers have shown that human umbilical cord stem cells, obtained after birth, can be reprogrammed to act as brain cells (neurons and glia). Until now, umbilical cord stem cells have been used to fight blood diseases in children such as leukemia.

"What we know from this is that umbilical cord blood contains stem cells able to differentiate into neural cells," Dr. Sanberg said. Stem cells are multipotent cells--able to grow into other kinds of cells.

"This finding suggests that umbilical cord blood is a noncontroversial, readily available source of stem cells for brain repair, and could provide an alternative to using embryonic cells," Dr. Sanberg said.
LINK

Reprogramming is the big hurdle. The major purported medical advantage of fetal stem cells has been their reprogrammability.

Now that it's been demonstrated that hurdle can be cleared, the case against some imperative "need" for fetal stem cell research is what is actually closed... morally, politically, and scientifically.

[Torie]

that doesn't mean that they should be pursued with no regard for morality or ethics.

Fine. Make your case there. That is my whole point. On that you have your a priori assumptions, and I have mine. I respect yours. I don't get much respect for mine around here on this topic, but that's OK.

[WOSG]

Yes, Fumento is great... he actually exposed the MYth of Heterosexual AIDS even earlier in the 1980s, but Govt policy wonks never listened ... on this matter, I am sure he is right too. He does his homework well. I would say though that what we can do today and what we can do in 10 years are dramatically different. Science has a lot to teach us yet.

[Sabertooth]

Fine. Make your case there. That is my whole point. On that you have your a priori assumptions, and I have mine. I respect yours. I don't get much respect for mine around here on this topic, but that's OK.

Perhaps I'm unclear as to your a priori assumptions.

[Sabertooth]

Yes, Fumento is great... he actually exposed the MYth of Heterosexual AIDS even earlier in the 1980s, but Govt policy wonks never listened.

My cousin was an intern at UCSF in the mid-1980s, and in 1985 he told me that anal sex between homosexual men was and would remain the principle vector of transmission. This information was suppressed in lieu of the homosexual political agenda, at the cost of hundreds of thousands of their own lives.

[Torie]

I don't think embryonic life in the first trimester should receive legal protection, because I don't think there is any sentinence.

[RadioAstronomer]

I don't think embryonic life in the first trimester should receive legal protection, because I don't think there is any sentinence.

I completely agree.

[aruanan]

FUMENTO BUMP!!

Fumento hate mail bump, as well.

[Sabertooth]

I don't think embryonic life in the first trimester should receive legal protection, because I don't think there is any sentinence.

Is there sentience in the comatose? In the anencephalic?

If a woman is 10 weeks pregnant and is assaulted, resulting in a miscarriage, is this just your garden-variety aggravated assault?

In any event, I think you'd agree that there is a significant faction in the GOP coalition that disagrees with your first trimester exception. From a purely pragmatic standpoint, given the demonstrated scientific promise of other, less morally problematic lines of stem cell inquiry besides the fetal, why risk the political fallout of the fetal stem cell tar baby?

[Torie]

We have already discussed the politics. Your road has more risks. If someone is permanently comatose (and if we are unsure about the permanence, that is another matter), I think the state should not pay for continued maintenance. What the relatives decide to do is up to them. The misscarriage is another source of civil damage, and a more severe injury for criminal purposes. Should it be a homicide? No, IMO. Yes, I am drawing distinctions. I am drawing lines based on certain a priori values about what is life, and what isn't. There is no right or wrong answer when one draws such lines IMO, except through the lens of one's own a priori values and assumptions.

[RadioAstronomer]

I spoke in haste. I still think sentience does not exist at that time; however, your other arguments raise questions I am unable to address with a clear conscience.

I rescind my statement.

[Torie]

By the way, it is legal now to pull the plug on the permanently comatose, and should be.

[jwalsh07]

How do you measure sentience?

[Sabertooth]

By the way, it is legal now to pull the plug on the permanently comatose, and should be.

Yes, because "pulling the plug" isn't murder.

The distinction lies in the act, not in the state of the victim, as it is still illegal to pull the plug and then slit the throat of the comatose, and should be.

[Torie]

I refer you to the Easterbrook article on Brainwaves. I think you saw it at the time, no?

[Torie]

Yep, they just let them dehydrate and die. I think an injection would be appropriate myself. In fact, there was a murder trial on this very point many years ago in LA. The case was dismissed by the judge because the doctors lacked malice. The judge pulled a legal slight of hand.