President's council on bioethics speaks out against ... the president
Cross-posted from the Great Beyond
Ten members of the 18-member President's Council on Bioethics have criticised US President Barack Obama's recent executive order lifting the restrictions on federal funding for human embryonic stem-cell research.
In their statement, the ten say Obama's order is "a step backward" with regards to "the progress that had been made in reconciling the needs of research and the moral concerns of many Americans". Obama's order reversed a policy put in place by George W. Bush in August 2001, which permitted federal funding for research on human embryonic stem cells, but only on cell lines that had been derived by the date of his speech.
Much of the dispute centers on the source of the embryos that could be used for such research. Obama's order does not specify the source of the embryos: whether they are leftover embryos from in-vitro fertilisation clinics, or are created for the purpose of research. This is the source of much of the council criticism. The story has been picked up predominantly by the conservative press (Weekly Standard).
The statement did not come from the council itself, but rather from ten of its members speaking out on their personal beliefs. The council, created in its current form by Bush in 2001, has come under fire before, for instance in 2004 when one of its members was dismissed after speaking out against Bush's stance on stem-cell research (Nature). The council in its current form is constituted through 30 September 2009.
Posted by Alex Witze on March 27, 2009