T1B

The OverCell
Federalism and human life.

Do human embryos have a moral status that obliges us to treat them as something a bit more sacred than tinker toys?
My personal answer is yes. But after three decades of debate on life issues, I'm pessimistic that many Americans who disagree can be persuaded otherwise.

The moral status of embryos — like the status of fetuses or teenagers — is ultimately a matter of faith, of first principles. Those who make utilitarian arguments for euthanasia, abortion or, for that matter, genocide can be perfectly "rational" in the sense that they can employ logic with the best of them. They simply start from different moral assumptions. Nazis and Communists killed millions and they could be very logical in their justifications — but logical in that whole evil genius sense. On the other side of the spectrum, pro-life, Buddhist vegans — who literally wouldn't hurt a fly — can be very logical, too. They just follow a different set of assumptions. One could say it's a sign of moral progress that we've at least shunted our debates over who has a right to life to murderers, the unborn and the very, very ill.

Or maybe not. Regardless, the moral debate often overshadows more practical arguments.

During the 2004 presidential campaign, John Kerry and his supporters complained that President Bush had "banned" embryonic-stem-cell research. John Kerry proclaimed, "Here in America we don't sacrifice science for ideology" — a deeply ideological point itself, when you think about it. Ron Reagan, a very liberal former dog-show announcer and ballet dancer who happens to share the name of his late father, was proclaimed a walking profile in courage for exploiting his father's memory in order to support the Democrats on the issue of embryonic stem cell research. At the Democratic Convention, he suggested that if Democrats were in power, then perhaps in a decade or so you could have your very own "personal biological repair kit waiting for you at the hospital." People with Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, or various other calamitous and heartbreaking diseases could simply get an injection and be "cured." It's not "magic," Reagan promised, but simply the "medicine of the future."
Another popular line of argument was that America would fall behind the rest of world as a leader in science, ceding pole position to Europe, South Korea, or China.

Much of the mainstream media was so convinced by this sort of thinking that for a while political analysts — and the Kerry campaign — were claiming that the stem-cell issue would decide the election for the Democrats.

All of this was suffused with bad faith. Ron Reagan's pandering to the false hopes of desperate families was disgusting. Moreover, Bush didn't ban embryonic-stem-cell research — he regulated federal funding of it. Public funding of adult-stem-cell research and private embryonic-stem-cell research were left untouched.

Meanwhile, an article in the May/June issue of Foreign Policy by Robert L. Paarlberg, reports that America is still leading the world in embryonic-stem-cell research. Many European countries — which were supposed to have eaten our lunch in this area — actually have vastly more restrictive laws than our own. There's been virtually no brain drain of American scientists fleeing to more hospitable climes, while thousands of European scientists have fled their own bureaucratic and restrictive lands to work in America. Pharmaceutical and biotech R&D investment is flying into the United States. And many states, led by California, are spending billions to make up for the perceived shortfall from the feds.

This is the great irony of the whole debate. What offends some liberals is that the federal government isn't involved — and the federal government should do whatever they think is good. Leaving this to the states and the private sector is just too unsatisfying. Meanwhile, some pro-life conservatives who would like to see a far more comprehensive ban on the practice are largely powerless to affect the course of the research at all now that it's out of Washington's hands.

And that's as it should be. Federalism — sending tough issues to the lowest, most local levels possible — is the best compromise one can ask for when dealing with such issues. The alternative is to ask the federal government almost literally to split the baby. Sure, more federal funding might advance the science a bit faster. But the current system has one great advantage. It doesn't force people who think human life is precious to pay for its destruction.

U.S. falling behind in stem-cell research
Government policy handcuffing scientific progress, many fear
By GARETH COOK
Boston Globe
Posted: June 6, 2004

Brno, Czech Republic - Last spring, biologist Petr Dvorak's cell phone rang with the news that his lab had just entered the forefront of global science.
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He rushed to work, down a cracked blacktop walkway and past a sagging barbed-wire fence. Then Dvorak, 48, peered through a microscope and saw what had triggered the call: He and his team had isolated a new line of human embryonic stem cells.

"We were so happy," said Dvorak, who is a member of the Czech Academy of Sciences. "I couldn't sleep for a week."

Although the first human embryonic stem-cell line was created in the United States, a Globe survey has found that the majority of new embryonic cell lines - colonies of potent cells with the ability to create any type of tissue in the human body - are now being created overseas, a concrete sign that American science is losing its pre-eminence in a key field of 21st-century research.
Few lines available

Nearly three years ago, the Bush administration prohibited the use of federal money to work with any embryonic cell lines created after Aug. 9, 2001, because of moral concerns over the destruction of human embryos.

At the time, the president said there would be more than 60 lines of these cells available. But today there are only 19 usable lines created before that date, and that number is never likely to rise above 23, according to the National Institutes of Health.

The number of cell lines available to the world's researchers, but off-limits to U.S. government-funded researchers, is much higher: at least 51, according to the survey. It could rise to more than 100 over the coming year.

There are three new lines in Dvorak's lab, with four more in progress. And there are also new lines in Sweden, Israel, Finland and South Korea. And recently the world's first public bank of embryonic stem cells opened in the United Kingdom, where there are at least five new lines and more on the way.

"Science is like a stream of water, because it finds its way," said Susan Fisher, a professor at the University of California, San Francisco. "And now it has found its way outside the United States."
Slowing the pace

At a time when reports show the U.S. is losing its dominance in other areas of science, Fisher and many other researchers say they are increasingly worried that America is not building a competitive foundation in one of the most active areas of biological discovery.

Many scientists believe that embryonic stem-cell research has the potential to yield profound insights into a range of afflictions, including Parkinson's disease and diabetes, which affect millions of Americans.

By restricting American use of these cells, they say, the government is effectively keeping them out of the hands of many top scientists - slowing the pace of research that could lead to cures and potentially putting the country behind in technologies that could be major business opportunities in the new century.

Included on the list of off-limits cell lines created since 2001 are some cells that are easier to use and would be safer for patients than the Bush-approved lines. Others are tailored for the study of particular diseases.
Rebellion in party

Each cell line is a colony of cells derived from a single embryo, which share the same DNA.

One of the new cell lines has the common genetic mutation underlying cystic fibrosis.

This cell line, developed overseas and not yet described in a scientific journal, could reveal the biological underpinnings of a debilitating disease that affects some 30,000 Americans. The U.S. government will not pay for scientists to grow or study these cells because they were created recently.

The ballooning list of forbidden cell lines could add energy to a rebellion over stem-cell policy within the Republican Party.

Thirty-six Republicans were among the 206 members of the House who signed a letter asking the president to reconsider the ban.

For most diseases, embryonic stem-cell research is likely many years from offering any help to patients. But it is becoming increasingly apparent that if researchers begin to make medical progress, the U.S. government - which funds the vast majority of basic science research in this country - will be able to take little credit.

For many foreign scientists, the restrictions imposed on the world's leading biomedical power represent an opportunity.

Dvorak once used old rum bottles as flasks in his underfunded lab. Now he is talking to a professor at Harvard Medical School, Ole Isacson, about collaborating on research.

"He is swimming," said Isacson, whose lab at McLean Hospital is famous for its research on Parkinson's disease. "But for us, it is like trying to swim on dry land."

When human embryonic stem cells were first isolated, the breakthrough happened in an American lab.

In November 1998, a team of researchers led by biologist James Thomson of the University of Wisconsin-Madison announced it had isolated human embryonic stem cells and could grow them in a dish.
Difficult to handle

Embryonic stem cells, taken from a microscopic embryo in its first few days of development, are in a sense the most primordial and powerful human cells and can develop into any part of the body.

The work is ethically controversial because growing stem cells requires destroying a human embryo. This led critics to charge the practice amounted to taking human lives and could not be justified no matter how great the potential benefits.

In 2001, President Bush attempted to broker a compromise: In a nationally televised speech, he said federally funded research would be limited to cell lines already in existence.

He said that the more than 60 lines already derived would be enough for researchers to continue their work without using government money to destroy more embryos.

Although much basic biological research remains to be done on the cell lines created before Aug. 9, 2001, it has become clear to American scientists that the Bush policy has put them at a disadvantage compared with many of their colleagues overseas.

Human embryonic stem cells are notoriously difficult to handle, and deriving each new line gives the team in the laboratory a deeper understanding of stem-cell biology and essential practical skills.

"A lot of stem-cell biology is like gardening," said Stephen Minger, who isolated the cystic fibrosis cell line and is an American scientist who now works at King's College London. "Some people can grow orchids, and some can't grow tomatoes."

Governments around the world are stepping into the gap, and a number are emerging as powerhouses in the field.

In the United Kingdom there has been contentious public debate over embryonic cell research, but the government has designed a system of strict oversight.
Ethical standards drawn

The new UK Stem Cell Bank north of London, funded by the government at $4.6 million over three years, will accept cell lines that meet a set of ethical standards, carefully study and grow them to ensure they are scientifically useful, and then make them available to researchers.

In Australia, the government is funding research and helping to set up a national stem-cell center.

In the Czech Republic, Dvorak's lab at the Mendel University of Agriculture and Forestry is part of a Centre for Cell Therapy and Tissue Repair, supported by the government.

South Korea has derived almost as many new lines of human embryonic stem cells as the U.S., according to the Globe survey.
Layer of mouse cells

This rush of work overseas is yielding other important advances, such as technology that could be key in turning the science of embryonic stem cells into usable therapies.

All of the cell lines on the U.S. government-approved list are grown on a layer of mouse cells.

These mouse cells, called a "feeder layer," sustain the human cells, but could also transmit mouse-borne viruses, making them potentially dangerous for use in humans.

Dvorak's laboratory has just begun working with human feeder cells instead, a technique that could yield cells safe to transplant back into humans. Already, laboratories in Singapore, Israel, Sweden and Finland have isolated lines of stem cells that don't need mouse feeder cells. Only one American lab has done so: Susan Fisher's California lab, which is barred from receiving federal funding and is supported in part by the California-based biotech Geron Corp.

None of these lines, including Fisher's, can be used by government-funded scientists in America. The result is that American scientists with private funding are making advances that they can share freely with scientists overseas, but which they cannot share with colleagues in their own departments.
Private funding for research

As much as the Bush rules have limited embryonic stem-cell research, they have prompted a substantial private effort to keep the research moving forward.

Harvard announced last month that it is building a privately funded effort to do the work, and it has a fund-raising goal of $100 million.

The University of California, San Francisco is already under way with a similar effort, started with a $5 million gift from Intel's Andy Grove, as are a number of other academic institutions.

Earlier this month, the governor of New Jersey signed an agreement opening the nation's first state-funded stem-cell institute.

Thanks partly to this effort, none of the researchers contacted by the Globe said they had seen signs of a scientific "brain drain" that some critics predicted. But still they worry about the more subtle side effects of the Bush policy.

Many of the world's top disease specialists work at universities in the U.S., yet they are largely unable to work on embryonic stem cells, and the universities are likely to have more trouble recruiting talented foreign scientists interested in embryonic stem cells.

At the same time, top American researchers who might otherwise jump into the field are avoiding it because of the risks, scientists said. And some worry that younger scientists, who don't have an established lab to keep them in the U.S., will move abroad, and perhaps stay there.

"That is really something to keep on eye on," said John Gearhart, one of the field's founders and a professor at Johns Hopkins Medicine.

Yet there could be changes coming.

The NIH has issued a letter hinting the White House may be open to changing its policy at some point. The letter, written by NIH director Elias A. Zerhouni, was a response to the House's letter. In it, he acknowledges that "from a purely scientific perspective more cell lines may well speed some areas of human embryonic stem-cell research."

U.S. Rep. Michael N. Castle, a Delaware Republican who helped organize the House letter, said that it seems to represent a softening of the White House stance.

In Congress, he said, support for stem-cell research is increasing, adding that he has been struck by the degree to which some people change their minds when they meet patients who are suffering.

"There doesn't seem to be a lot of gray area," Castle said. "They become real advocates."

Although the first human embryonic stem-cell line was created in the United States, a Globe survey has found that the majority of new embryonic cell lines - colonies of potent cells with the ability to create any type of tissue in the human body - are now being created overseas, a concrete sign that American science is losing its pre-eminence in a key field of 21st-century research.

The number of cell lines available to the world's researchers, but off-limits to U.S. government-funded researchers, is much higher: at least 51, according to the survey. It could rise to more than 100 over the coming year.

At a time when reports show the U.S. is losing its dominance in other areas of science, Fisher and many other researchers say they are increasingly worried that America is not building a competitive foundation in one of the most active areas of biological discovery.

Many scientists believe that embryonic stem-cell research has the potential to yield profound insights into a range of afflictions, including Parkinson's disease and diabetes, which affect millions of Americans.

By restricting American use of these cells, they say, the government is effectively keeping them out of the hands of many top scientists - slowing the pace of research that could lead to cures and potentially putting the country behind in technologies that could be major business opportunities in the new century.

Although much basic biological research remains to be done on the cell lines created before Aug. 9, 2001, it has become clear to American scientists that the Bush policy has put them at a disadvantage compared with many of their colleagues overseas.

Many of the world's top disease specialists work at universities in the U.S., yet they are largely unable to work on embryonic stem cells, and the universities are likely to have more trouble recruiting talented foreign scientists interested in embryonic stem cells.

At the same time, top American researchers who might otherwise jump into the field are avoiding it because of the risks, scientists said. And some worry that younger scientists, who don't have an established lab to keep them in the U.S., will move abroad, and perhaps stay there.

May/June issue of Foreign Policy by Robert L. Paarlberg, reports that America is still leading the world in embryonic-stem-cell research. Many European countries — which were supposed to have eaten our lunch in this area — actually have vastly more restrictive laws than our own. There's been virtually no brain drain of American scientists fleeing to more hospitable climes, while thousands of European scientists have fled their own bureaucratic and restrictive lands to work in America. Pharmaceutical and biotech R&D investment is flying into the United States. And many states, led by California, are spending billions to make up for the perceived shortfall from the feds.

Much of the mainstream media was so convinced by this sort of thinking that for a while political analysts — and the Kerry campaign — were claiming that the stem-cell issue would decide the election for the Democrats.

All of this was suffused with bad faith. Ron Reagan's pandering to the false hopes of desperate families was disgusting.

No citations? Neither does yours:

All this guy does is quote a guy who wrote ANOTHER article, which does not include any verifiable facts, either.

gee - no editorializing going on there.

And the point you're missing is that any top scientists that are government funded will have no access to any of these breakthroughs.

The other point being that virtually the entire world is pursuing embryonic stem cell research, so what exactly is Bush hoping to prove by restricting it?