This summer, President Bush vetoed a bill that would have authorized
additional federal government spending for embryonic stem cell research. He
said, "This bill would support the taking of innocent human life in the hope
of finding medical benefits for others.
"It crosses a moral boundary that our decent society needs to respect, so I
vetoed it."
Given the need to protect human rights, we find this veto appropriate,
mostly because it's ethical, but also because it's good science.
Like the president, we support using adult stem cells to develop
medical treatments. But we oppose the destruction of embryonic
human beings in experiments.
Human adult stem cell treatments are already being used to alleviate human
suffering from over 90 different ailments. These medical interventions have
already cured thousands of people.
But, so far, human embryonic stem cells have not cured a single human
medical condition. That's as in none, nada, zero; not experimentally, or in
controlled clinical trials, or in general medical use.
The word bigot comes to mind. And it's a pretty strong word.
But we think it appropriately describes some people who promote embryonic
stem cell research. They are loudly intolerant of other beliefs and add
injury to insult by extracting our tax money to support their activities.
Time for a recap on the current state of knowledge about stem cells.
Unlike differentiated cells in our bodies, such as muscle, bone, or blood
cells, stem cells can turn into several different kinds of cells. For
example, stem cells inside the bone marrow divide and release millions of
white and red blood cells into the blood stream every second.
Then, although often glossed over, there are several varieties of "stem
cells." Your body's own "adult" stem cells often quickly fill in the gaps
when more cells of a certain type are needed, such as more skin cells.
"Embryonic" or "pluripotent" stem cells are taken from very young human
embryos, less than one week old. These cells are considered prime targets
for research because they can become specialized and differentiate into all
the other types of cell in the body, such as brain, blood, and gut cells.
One of the problems is that taking embryonic stem cells from human embryos
kills the nascent human being.
This is just plain language, biology and common sense, not philosophy,
ideology, or religion. Men's and women's bodies make living spermatozoa and
egg cells respectively. Alone, these cells die after a few days. But when
united in appropriate circumstances, sperm and egg cells merge and a new,
unique human life begins. This life is "new" in the sense that it's neither
the father's or the mother's life but a result of the union of their lives.
Human life is continuous, and not biologically interrupted with a
"non-human" phase that later results in a human being. It's human life all
the way through.
Yet some research scientists, such as Dr. Gabriela Cezar of the University
of Wisconsin at Madison do "not believe a fertilized egg is a human being"
even though "she respects the beliefs of right-to-life advocates" according
to a Jan. 24 article by Brian Clark, editor of WisBusiness.com. In the
article, she isn't quoted about what she "believes" a fertilized human egg
is or what it should be called.
If we want to discuss legalities or debate ideologies, we could
appropriately ask, "When should killing and experimentation on human beings
be allowed?" But because the question is distasteful when accurately stated,
Dr. Cezar and others try to twist words around and pretend that these human
embryos are somehow not human.
Yet every person reading this article was once an embryo. If you weren't
human then, what were you?
All this hoopla hasn't resulted in any cures, just a lot of dead embryos. In
contrast, adult stem cells can be collected from many human tissues with the
consent of - and without killing - the donor. The medical cures are
remarkable.
In spite of the great scientific and medical advances in non-embryonic stem
cell research and treatment, stem cell bigots lambaste a person who dares to
question their particular orthodoxy as (Heaven forbid) a theocrat, a moral
pope or ayatollah and on a par with those who once opposed rail travel - and
these names are only what United States Senators call the President. Others,
such as the Los Angeles and New York Times describe opponents as religious
conservatives who have stalled medical progress for years and religious
extremists, respectively.
Name calling is a major tool in the bigots' armory.
They are extremely intolerant of anyone who dares to suggest that human
embryonic stem cells are people in the earliest stages of their lives.
How else does this bigotry show up?
Sometimes it's implicit in a "here's a stick in your eye" attitude about
other people's concerns, such as manifest in a 2004 California ballot
initiative, Proposition 71.
This would require the state of California to spend $3 billion on embryonic
stem cell research through a new stem-cell research agency, the California
Institute for Regenerative Medicine.
The sponsors of this initiative apparently feel that their personal feelings
and goals are so inherently worthy that they are even willing to lie about
the science.
The proposition implies that the stem cell research that has the greatest
potential for therapies and cures would best be "specifically focused on
pluripotent stem cell" research. This leaves the impression that pluripotent
or embryonic stem cells have already shown more significant results than
adult stem cells.
As noted above, the opposite is true.
Ironically, some embryonic stem cell research proponents worry about being
limited by other people's narrow opinions. Yet they don't seem to be worried
about taking tax money to spend on their own narrow opinions.
How we think about what it means to be human gets pretty close to the heart
of the matter. When some human life is thought to be disposable for the
benefit other human life, we're not far from human puppy farms.
Editor's Note: Robert J. Cihak wrote this week's column
