President Bush went on national TV to announce that embryonic stem cell research is the `leading edge of a series of moral hazards' and he would be banning federal funding for the research. He also cautioned that federal funds could only be used for research on already existing stem cell lines, about 60 of them at that time.
Stem cells are the hottest topic in biotechnology today and the subject of national debate. It is an undeniable fact that stem cell research will open gates to a revolution in medical science and hold answers to cell-based therapies to treat diseases such as Alzheimer's, juvenile diabetes, Parkinson's disease, spinal cord injuries, and even cancer and heart attacks, ailments every family can relate to.
If stem cell research has so much potential, why did it create the vast controversy and sharp division in political circles?
Unique properties
Stem cells are unspecialised primitive cells that have two capabilities: they can renew themselves through cell division, and more importantly they can be induced to become cells with special functions such as beating cells of heart muscle or insulin-producing cells of pancreas. They are present in the body, more so in the rapidly growing entities like the bone marrow and the embryos.
Embryonic stem cell research, while still in its infancy, has the potential to treat or cure more than 100 million Americans who suffer from a wide range of illnesses from heart disease to spinal cord injuries to diabetes. Scientists derive these stem cells from embryos, mostly the leftover embryos from fertility clinics. These embryos are created in the laboratory in which an egg from an infertile woman is fertilised with a sperm from the father or a donor. In normal development, an embryo grows rapidly. By Day Five, the growing embryo, called a blastocyst, contains 250 to 300 cells, including an inner mass of stem cells. These embryonic stem cells have an enormous potential of differentiating into more than 200 cell types in the human body and can be used to treat a vast array of diseases, which are hard to treat otherwise.
Adult stem cells, unlike embryonic stem cells, are scattered throughout the tissues of the body, and they are far more difficult to isolate and grow in cultures. Adult stem cells do not have the potential of differentiating into various organs as embryonic stem cells, and they generally produce the cell types of the tissues in which they live; adult stem cells from muscles can only produce muscle tissue.
Embryonic stem cells used for research typically come from 4-to-5-day-old embryos, whose development must be terminated to extract the stem cells. The embryos come from fertility clinics; quite a few embryos are created from each infertile couple and only a few are used. The leftover embryos are used in stem cell research. But President Bush and his right-to-life groups believe extracting stem cells from five-day-old embryos amounts to destroying life and is similar to abortion.
Ethical questions
Stem cell research raises important ethical questions, but these clusters of cells are not life unless they are successfully implanted into a woman's uterus. Under Bush's stem cell policy, 400,000 surplus embryos at fertility clinics all over the country are eventually destroyed instead of a few thousands being used for research to enhance life. If embryonic stem cell research amounts to abortion, destroying these leftover embryos at these clinics could also be considered as abortion and all the fertility clinics should be shut down, depriving millions of infertile couples of the chance for a child.
Though claimed to be in its infancy, stem cell research is progressing at a fast pace. The recent brilliant scientific breakthrough in South Korea, where gene-specific stem cells are created by transplanting human DNA that are ready to be used in humans, shows how fast the progress is being made.
Will the United States be part of the most exciting medical research of our time? With restrictions on federal grants, the U.S. researchers will have their hands tied and will not be able to do justice to their efforts. Religious extremists are hijacking the political system and impeding a brilliant scientific future that can help millions at home and abroad. The U.S. should lead the giant step forwards, not watch from a distance.
