The Stem Cell Research Debate

Great Debates
1

I just got back from a hearing on a stem cell research, bill 725, and I’d like to share the points that the hearing brought up so the excellent minds at SDMB can pick through them.

First off, should the government even be involved in stem cell research? Should SCR just be privately funded by biotech companies or does the moral and ethical dilemma force this to be a governmental issue?

There were basically four major stem cell research topics hit upon:

  1. Healthcare
  2. Economic Development
  3. Ethical
  4. Legal

The current bill in MA being proposed bans cloning and sale of embryos plus requires donor consent. The bill also supports somatic cell nuclear transfer

The first speaker, a CEO and entrepreneur, emphasized that stem cell research by 2010 could create 100,000 jobs and grow into a $10 billion industry. She also warned against the brain drain that MA could experience if we continue to lag behind states like CA, NY, WI and NJ. The committee raised concerns about biotech firms self-policing themselves since a lot of their money is coming from pharmaceutical companies.

The second speaker, a professor and bio-ethicist, was absolutely atrocious and sadly had the most important topic to speak about. She said that there is no moment of conception since it takes 24 hours for an egg to fertilize and embryos only have potential to become human if they’re implanted in a uterus. She also explained that there are two types of stem cells. One type creates organisms and the other creates tissue. Also stem cell viability decreases with age.

The third and fourth speakers were from the Catholic church. The third speaker emphasized that the Catholic church supports adult stem cell research and called embryonic stem cell research an assault on human life. Then she made the Dr. Mengele comparison how sixty years ago, there were people who experimented on other humans and the world declared that it will never again happen. She also asserted the Legislature should not have the power to decide who lives or dies. Yet, apparently it’s okay that a faith I don’t adhere to can make my healthcare decisions. Ditto for the President who I didn’t vote for.

The fourth speaker claims that stem cell legislation encourages destruction of human beings and is a road to destruction. He also said that SCR is not medicine at all, it’s a scandal supported by over eager scientists and Hollywood types. He also offered this analogy: imagine a schoolhouse full of children and around it there’s a wall of fire. Outside the fire, you have scientist with a robot that can go into the school and remove the children’s organs because they’re going to die anyway. He also claimed that the potential brain drain issue is false.

Questions? Debate? Insights?

2

You can’t ban cloning and support somatic cell nuclear transfer. They’re one and the same.

This little assurance was thrown in to sneak a bill past that would indeed permit cloning.

3

No, they’re not the same.

I suspect that the bill bans reproductive cloning but supports somatic cell nuclear transport (aka therapeutic cloning). A bill that banned “cloning” would essentially bring modern molecular biology to a halt, as that merely means making identical copies of a gene, cell, or organism.

Somatic cell nuclear transfer involves removing the nucleus of an unfertilized egg cell, replacing it with the material from the nucleus of a somatic cell (non-reproductive cell), and stimulating this cell to begin dividing. This is essentially how stem cells are created currently.

IMHO, the ship has already sailed on this. Pro-lifers can jump up and down and hold their breath and do whatever else they want, but ESC will continue to go forward. If they ever did get a ban here, it would simply move to another country (England and South Korea are already making inroads). The question is then simply, “Do you want the research done in the US or overseas?”

Also, until I see these groups protesting IVF as vehemently as ESC (to be fair, some do), I’ll write them off as grandstanders latching on to the hot issue.

On the other side of the coin, some proponents are probably hyping too much. It likely will not be a miracle cure-all for everything, or possibly even anything. It is far too soon to tell. Even so, even if it “just” gives us insight into early embryonic development, it is worthwhile.

4

If embryonic stem cell research is an “assault on human life” so terrible that the US Govt. cannot condone funding it (as it does virtually all other areas of biomedical research), that I cannot see much of a case for allowing private research to continue. We do not ban murder only so long as it requires public funding (death penalty states notwithstanding, I suppose).

Implicit in the debate, then, is that opponents of embryonic stem cell research cannot even approach mutually acceptable terms of artument with proponents based upon any commonly excepted criteria, e.g. empirical evidence, or demonstrable individual or societal harm. One ought to suspect, in such a dilemma, that the objections are likely to be of a religiously doctrinaire nature, and hence there can be no consensus position (since there is no consensus position on religious doctrine, even with particular Christian sects, for example). To oppose embryonic stem cell research is to endorse a narrow theological definition of “life”. In my oppinion, that’s a clear violation of the separation of church and state. Unless the opponents of embryonic stem cell research can come up with better arguing points than ludicrous comparisons to the heinous and thoroughly unscientific Nazi “research” carried out on decidedly post-natal human subjects, I would feel most comfortable if they were given the deference due to them, and simply laughed out of the room.

Unfortunately, since the country is under the influence of Christian literalists and potentially aspiring theocrats, there’s little hope a sane debate on the moral and ethical issues can be had; not until they are (one might fervently hope) deposed in our customary democratic manner.

5

Why wouldn’t he just use the robot to remove the children from the schoolhouse? Damn scientists and their agendas!

=)

6

Hold on there buddy. The bill hasn’t been passed and jk145 is correct. They are banning reproductive cloning and supporting somatic nucular cell. My notes were a little shaky so that’s why the OP was unclear on that issue.

7

Indeed, ES cells derived from cloned somatic nuclei are the more likely therapeutic candidates, as numerous issues with rejection, and even (the perhaps remote) potentiall of GVHD, are removed by using the host’s genome. There could be immunogenic and other problems due to foreign mitochondria present in the cloned cells, should they be derived from individuals not related to the host (e.g. the production of mitochondrial heteroplasmy). So long as there are female relatives of the same mitochondrial lineage who can donate eggs, that potential problem can be removed as well, quite probably.

In any event, the production of embryos derived from cloned somatic nuclei is likely to be a similar, if not an identical process to the production of clones for reproductive purposes. In other words, these cloned embryos could be viable to term if implanted, and if the technology exists and is widespread, it’s almost guaranteed someone, somewhere, will try it.

It’s an urgent and legitimate ethical concern, for which I do not have a good solution myself. As mentioned above, however, the cloning genie is out of the bottle, and the technology to produce human clones of “reproductive quality”, if not extant, will be in short order without a draconian worldwide ban. Rather like, say, nuclear power and the potential for weaponizing that techonology. Given other precedents of beneficial technologies that have nefarious applications, I say it’s better to study the issue thoroughly so we can understand what we’re dealing with. It’s certainly better to understand the pros and cons of human reproductive cloning as much as is ethically possible via peer-reviewed science, rather than to have it going on in a clandestine fashion, which is, as far as I can predict, an inevitability in any eventuality.