A research specialist carries trays of human embryonic stem cells at the University of Michigan Center for Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research Laboratory in Ann Arbor, Mich. The University of Michigan announced Monday, March 9 it was launching the state's first major embryonic stem cell research program since Micgigan voters eased restrictions on such work in November 2008. The university unveiled plans the same day President Obama signed an executive order that ends former President George W. Bush's limits on using federal dollars for stem cell research.
It is astounding that Andrea would share the spin of the embryonic stem cell research, ESCR, movement as fact.
It is simply not accurate to say that ESCR provides the likely gateway to “lifelong solutions,” and that adult stem cell research does not.
Dr. James Thomson, the first scientist to coax stem cells from human embryos (and still a firm ESCR supporter), said in a September 2008 press conference that his field will be focusing on adult stem cells going forward, since “I personally believe that the future is in (those) cells.”
Why? In 2007, Thomson and a group of Japanese scientists were the first to essentially reprogram adult stem cells into an embryonic state.
Andrea also did not mention the overwhelming studies demonstrating problems with ESCR – such as tumor development, rejection and chromosomal abnormalities – that don’t exist with adult stem cells.
Just because a particular clinical trial doesn’t include adult cells, doesn’t mean ESCR is more promising.
In an exploding field where clinical breakthroughs are literally announced daily, it’s far more likely that someone hasn’t yet had time to experiment with that particular permutation.
In the end, though, all those issues are secondary. Embryonic stem cells do seem to promise a near-miraculous source of healing – but at what cost?
Their miraculous healing power comes because of the miracle of life, which obviously must start at conception – or else all those embryonic stem cells would be dormant and powerless.
Some believe those cells may someday be able to be routinely harvested without destroying the embryo. But until then, every bit of advancement from ESCR comes at the cost of a human life.
Down through history, we always have condemned unscrupulous medical people who kill the frail to save the strong – for example, the corrupt doctors in certain developing countries who harvest vital organs from living victims to save others.
Yet if it is true that an embryo is a human baby, then that is exactly what scientists are doing if they destroy an embryo during stem cell extraction.
If the miracle of a life has started, how tragic that we would view ending that life to cure someone else as something to “celebrate.”
Shaunti Feldhahn (scfeldhahn@yahoo.com) is a conservative Christian author and speaker, and married mother of two.