Renaming the Embyronic Stem Cell Registry recasts debate
The day that President Bush vetoed legislation to expand federal funding for embryonic stem cell research, he also issued an executive order calling for a plan to promote alternate sources of pluripotent stem cells, the details of which were announced today. Like the original executive order, it calls for the NIH Human Embryonic Stem Cell Registry to be renamed the NIH Pluripotent Stem Cell Registry.
The implication is that existing pluripotent stem cell lines are equivalent to embryonic stem cell lines. That’s not true. Many scientists think it could be true someday if current techniques advance, but many believe advancing pluripotent stem cells cannot be done without continuing to study embryonic stem cells.
The plan released today includes a soon-to-be-formalized program announcement to fund grants for research on alternative sources of human pluripotent stem cells including dead embryos, altered nuclear transfer (putting genetic material into an oocyte that will cause it to divide without forming a viable embryo), single cell embryo biopsy, and reprogramming somatic cells. These areas could all prove extremely valuable in understanding disease and testing therapies. Nonetheless, opponents of embryonic stem cell research must acknowledge that if this work is performed instead of rather than alongside work on embryonic stem cells, science will suffer and its fruits could be delayed.
Unfortunately, the language of the plan seems set to prevent such honest dialogue. You can read the plan, entitled “Expanding Approved Stem Cell Lines in Ethically Responsible Ways” here.
A shorter press release full of quotes from NIH experts is here.
The plan’s very title is an accusation. It implicitly casts such prominent scientists as Julie Baker, Doug Melton, Martin Pera, James Thomson and others as ethically irresponsible. I wonder if anyone in the President’s circle advised a less polarizing title, like “Expanding Approved Stem Cell Lines Without Destroying Embryos.” To be fair, those who promote embryonic stem cell research play language games too. At the ISSCR meeting in Australia last year, a speaker urged attendees to avoid using the word “embryo” when speaking about their research.
Rather than stating what they believe in, each side on this debate tries to argue against the beliefs of the other. Proponents try not to mention that the microscopic ball of cells that must be separated to make embryonic stem cells would, if implanted in a woman’s womb, likely become a baby. Opponents of embryonic stem cell research argue against the potential of that research rather than for the sanctity of the embryo. This makes both sides despise the other more than they would otherwise.
I doubt whether the two sides will ever agree whether an unimplanted human embryo counts as a human being, but unless people start using the same words to mean the same thing, there will not be cross-talk nor forward movement, but an effort-wasting, muddy tug of war.
Comments
You know, I think we had a chance to avoid the current contentious situation, but unfortunately, the people who would have been valuable on ethics advisory boards decided instead to take the heavy-handed approach and force their opinions through legislation.
It's hard now to take a step back because the usual way you resolve these issues is through compromise. Talk of compromise would raise the question if the craziness about teaching creationism in school was just an example of the old negotiating ploy of asking for outrageously unreasonable things so that the compromise will include your less unreasonable demands.
Posted by: Mr. Gunn | September 19, 2007 07:43 PM