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Who cares for nobody’s child? |
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STEM cell-based medical treatments are the new frontier of
scientific research. These cells can be obtained from a number of ethical sources:
cord blood, bone marrow, muscle, fat, nose cells and other adult tissues, but
they can also be obtained from embryos in a process that kills the embryo,
and this is where the moral dilemmas arise. An embryo is the start of life -- we were all embryos once. Significantly, all current medical treatments are from stem
cells from ethical sources. There are more than 60 successful treatments for conditions
ranging from blood disorders and heart damage to spinal and eye injuries
using these cells, and more are becoming available every week. In contrast, there is not even a clinical trial using embryonic
stem cells. During a recent stem cell debate Prof Mark Kirkland of the
Douglas Hocking Research Institute said: "Embryonic stem cell therapies
will not be a viable and generally available clinical option for at least
another 10 years, and by the time such therapies are available they will have
been supplanted by cellular therapies based on adult stem cells." Prof Kirkland also mentioned the tendency for embryonic stem
cells to cause tumours when used in treatments,
unlike adult stem cells. Martin Pera, research professor for But Prof Pera insisted these were
useful because they were able to become any kind of body cell, whereas adult
stem cells were limited in potential. I suggested that stem cells from ethical sources such as the
newly discovered cord blood embryonic cells could have most of the properties
of embryonic stem cells. He said he wasn't convinced, but would be pleased if this was
true because he "could do without the aggravation" presumably
caused by pro-lifers claiming dissection of embryos is an attack on human
life. An ethicist at the meeting acknowledged that human life begins
at conception/fertilisation but, because there were
potential benefits, he likened killing embryos for their stem cells to
"small-m murder". Another dilemma has been created by Prof Ian Wilmut,
of Dolly the sheep fame, who has asked he be allowed to clone embryos to
develop treatments for conditions such as motor neurone
disease. A clone is produced when an ovum has its nucleus removed and
replaced by a donor cell from an individual. The resultant embryo is a clone of the donor (a more-or-less
identical twin) but these embryos have neither mother nor father. They are
"nobody's children". Wilmut contends that by cloning embryos from
diseased people and extracting the stem cells, treatments may be developed
for currently incurable diseases. In June 2005 the Federal Government appointed a committee under
Judge John Lockhart to review The effect of these Acts was to prohibit human cloning and the
creation of embryos for any purpose other than to achieve a pregnancy, but
allowed certain uses of "excess" human embryos created through IVF. The Lockhart committee is accepting submissions until September
9. Write to the Lockhart Review if you believe that just because
"excess" embryos are "going to die anyway" they should
not be used for destructive research. We are all going to die, but preferably we should not be cut up
before we depart. Many of these "spare" embryos could be made available
for pre- natal adoption and implanted in the wombs of women who want them. President George W. Bush has made $1 million available in the babette@endeavourforum.org.au |