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Ethical Issues in Stem Cell Research{Printed in The Columbus Dispatch on July 31, 1999, p. 10A} A recent White House press release declared that the potential medical
benefits of stem cell research override others' ethical concerns. President
Clinton's National Bioethics Advisory Commission announced it is almost
ready to endorse this research. The Clinton Administration wants this
research federally funded, promising to obtain the cells "in an ethically
sound manner." Killing human embryos is the method proposed. This research is morally wrong. Federally funding it may also be illegal.
In 1996 Congress banned using federal funds for research destroying human
embryos. Those regulations will be sidestepped by funding only research
done after the stem cells have been obtained. Private funds will be used
to kill the embryos. The ethic seems to be that it's okay to reap the
benefits of others' questionable deeds once we don't directly pay for
them. This controversy began last year when researchers isolated stem cells
from human embryos. Stem cells have huge medical potential because they
can develop into almost any of the 210 different types of human cells.
Researchers hope to coax stem cells into becoming brain cells to treat
Parkinson's or Alzheimer's disease. Other stem cells could be nudged into
becoming healthy pancreatic tissue to replace that of diabetic patients.
In theory, any tissue type could be grown to replace diseased or missing
tissues. Stem cells hold great potential, but their supply is limited. However,
embryos (the term for fertilized eggs which have started dividing) contain
largely stem cells. Removing them, though, kills the embryo. The central
ethical question is whether the potential benefits of this research outweigh
the harm of destroying human embryos. Thousands of human embryos are sitting frozen in infertility clinics
around the nation. After their brothers or sisters are born, their parents
often leave them frozen, unsure what to do with them. Wouldn't it be better
to use them for some good rather than letting them go to waste? A group
of thirty-three Nobel Prize winners told President Clinton there was a
"moral imperative" to pursue this research. One patient advocacy
group stated "stem cell research is too promising to impede, slow,
or stop." However, medical research must be guided by more than pragmatic, cost-benefit
evaluations. Human embryos are living human beings in their earliest stage
of development. They don't have to be viewed as human persons to realize
they are more than just biological specimens. A 1994 National Institutes
of Health panel concluded they ought to be treated with "profound
respect." Yet the panel also approved of their destruction during
research. Noted bioethicist, Daniel Callahan, commented: "I have
always felt a nagging uneasiness at trying to rationalize killing something
for which I claim to have profound respect." Other researchers, physicians,
nurses, ethicists, and theologians oppose stem cell research using embryos.
Medical research should always respect its subjects. Research involving
children and others who cannot give consent is internationally restricted
to ensure the subjects benefit personally and are not placed at significant
risk of harm. Destroying human embryos harms them because it has the same
consequences as killing other humans. We are all disturbed by premature
death because of the loss of potential. Who might she have become? What
might he have done? We are outraged when that death is unnecessarily caused
by others. Yet precisely the same potential is lost when embryos are destroyed
in research. Who would these embryos have become, if only they had been
protected? What if you or I were chosen as stem cells sources when we
were embryos? Premature death also occurs from illnesses which stem cells might cure.
Research on treating these diseases should be promoted. But such laudable
goals and intentions do not justify killing other humans, even the smallest
human embryos. Their vulnerability cries out for their protection. Human
embryos are too small to see with the naked eye, too underdeveloped to
defend themselves, and apparently too inconsequential to warrant protection.
Yet the same could be said, and has been said (often in the name of greater
public goods), of other members of our species. Thankfully, stem cell research can proceed without killing embryos. According
to an April 4th Wall Street Journal article, researchers have made
fat, bone, and cartilage cells from stem cells found in adult bone marrow.
Others developed various blood cells from stem cells in adult blood. Elsewhere,
drugs are being developed to activate natural stem cells within people's
tissues. Many of the treatments everyone wants could be developed without
killing human embryos. Research which abuses its subjects is always morally tainted and casts
a shadow over the medical research enterprise. To fund stem cell research
while turning a blind eye to the killing of embryos is inexcusable. If
destroying them is morally unproblematic, why not fund that also? The
inconsistency raises red flags; so does claiming to profoundly respect
embryos while killing them. Research should protect, not destroy, even the smallest and most vulnerable stage of human life. To claim otherwise is to hold that some humans can be used as means to the ends of others. History teaches that this belief leads only to injustice and violence. See also Stem Cell Research: Bush's Policy
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