# 411 Friday, January 25, 2007 - WHERE IS THE BODY? Objections and Answers on Stem Cell Research
When I work with Americans for Cures Foundation, which I do about 10 hours a week, I write as a member of a team. Documents produced there reflect the strengths of individuals like Amy Daly, Constance McKee, Keith Proctor, Jacqueline Hantgan, David Bluestone, and Sara Jakka. Sometimes I will do a rough draft to try and get a framework going, and someone else will edit. Or I might do the same for them. Each of us has a different way to answer some of the attacks or objections the opposition may raise.
Amy Daly's approach, for example, is the high road.
If she were asked to respond to a nonsensical attack like, "Embryonic stem cell research kills people!," she would probably say something dignified and gentle, like:
"The only cells that are used for this research are cells that are excess and will be thrown into the trash. Using these cells for research instead of discarding them will allow us to find treatments and cures that will save life. Compare this to organ donation: In this case, the person who is donating the organs can not possibly live. So before life support is removed, the organs are taken to save lives. With embryonic stem cell research, these blastocysts can not possibly live (as they will be thrown away), and so before they are thrown away, the cells are taken to save lives."
Good stuff. Gentle, non-confrontational
But when I write for this column, I work with Karen Miner, whose idea of a calming influence is the advice given to President Harry Truman:, "Give `em Hell, Harry"—
to which Mr. T. replied, "I just give them the truth, and to them it feels like Hell!"
An honest question, concern, or polite objection deserves complete respect. Example:
Concern: "A woman who donates eggs for research undergoes invasive surgery, and receives hormone injections: this may put her health at risk."
Answer: this is a legitimate concern, which is why California asked the NIH to organize a two-day conference on the subject of egg donation health and safety issues, before even the first grants went out for new research. Wherever there is risk, (as in almost every medical procedure, which is why we sign release forms at the hospital) it should be mitigated. Donating eggs for research, however, involves the exact same procedures that have been used at In Vitro Fertility clinics, world-wide, for more than a decade. Roughly one million women have had the procedure, and the vast majority experienced no problems.
But does a propagandistic assault deserve the same courtesy as an intelligent concern?
The following contains personal answers to some of both kinds of question.
Attack: "Embryonic stem cell research kills people!"
Answer: If the research is murder, where is the body? In a court of law, before a charge of murder can be made, evidence in the form of an actual corpse must be produced. If anyone wishes to accuse our scientists, let them either bring out a body, or quit making these ridiculous charges. The simple truth, of course, is that we are talking about microscopic cells, not people.
Attack: "Even if called by another name, cloning is cloning; there is no difference between human reproductive cloning, and the so-called therapeutic cloning: all forms of cloning should be banned."
Answer: Human reproductive cloning (to make a child) endangers both mother and infant and should be banned, as it is in California. But to compare that to therapeutic cloning (to make stem cells) is like saying a lightning bolt and a light bulb are the same, since both involve electricity. Consider: if all forms of cloning were illegal, insulin for diabetics could not have been developed; crime scene police would have their workload increased, because cloning is used to produce dNA evidence; gardeners might be arrested, as the greenhouse technique of "cutting a slip" is a form of cloning: cutting a piece off a plant to grow it somewhere else. There are also food applications to consider: like cloning cows which produce the most milk—should we deny starving people access to milk by a blanket rejection of all forms of cloning?
Attack: "Whether frozen in liquid nitrogen, or implanted in the womb, a blastocyst is a child, and must be treated as the equal to any human. Location makes no difference."
Answer: As it is biologically impossible for an unimplanted blastocyst to become a child, location makes a huge difference. Frozen in liquid nitrogen, a blastocyst is tissue cells. Similarly, a tiny droplet of sperm contains many thousands of spermatozoa, any one of which might help create a human being if it linked up with an egg and implanted in the womb. Without implantation in the uterine wall, a blastocyst cannot become a child. This is just common sense: no woman, no womb-- no Mom, no baby.
Attack: "Scientists talk about more than 400,000 blastocysts left over from In Vitro Fertility procedures, and say that some of these could be used to make stem cell lines. Yet only a tiny proportion of those were designated for research. It is therefore impossible for the research can continue, since the donors of embryos are against it."
Answer: A recent survey showed that more than 2/3 In Vitro Fertility participants were willing to donate leftover blastocysts to science, after being told of the possibility. Consider the process. A woman donates usually about twenty eggs for the IVF procedure. These are mixed with sperm. The strongest one or two blastocysts are then implanted in the woman's womb, to help the childless couple make a family. But what happens to the other eggs and/or blastocysts? They may be frozen for another try later, stored forever for a monthly fee, donated to other couples (most people prefer to make their own), or be thrown away. Those options should always remain open. But if a couple decides to donate the unused materials to research for cure, that is also worthwhile.
Attack: "Religion and science agree that life begins at conception, the joining of sperm and egg, and embryonic stem cell research is therefore going against religion."
Answer: Religions disagree on when life begins. The Catholic Saint Thomas Aquinas felt it happened at the "quickening"
Attack: "The new skin cell reprogramming method (induced Pluripotentiary Stem cells, or iPS) is better than human embryonic stem cell research, so let's stop funding that, and put all our money on iPS."
Answer: The new form of stem cell derivation may perhaps be wonderful. But it is at present considered too dangerous for therapies (cancer risk) and may turn out to be less helpful than we hope. Even if it turns out to be a valuable new tool, it would be foolish to throw away the entire toolbox. Our best hopes for cure can be found in full stem cell research: adult, embryonic, nuclear transfer, as well the new iPS—but none at the exclusion of the others.
Attack: "Adult stem cells have brought treatments for 72 diseases, including spinal cord injury and Parkinson's. Therefore, there is no need for embryonic."
Answer: Where should paralyzed patients go to obtain these wonderful treatments? If good treatments are truly available, hundreds of thousands of suffering people would love to have them. Reality is otherwise: neither spinal cord injury nor Parkinson's have been successfully treated: these conditions have as yet no cure. Adult stem cell therapies are useful, and have helped with blood disease and cancer. With a research head start of more than 40 years, and massively preferential funding from the federal government, adult stem cell research has provided approximately nine FDA-approved treatments. But that is just the tip of the iceberg; chronic disease and disability are ravaging our country, and the world.
Objection: "My religion opposes embryonic stem cell research, so I must do the same."
Answer: Throughout history, religions have often blocked or obstructed medical breakthroughs. Dissection, the very basis of anatomy and medical research, was a death-penalty crime when religious forces ruled Europe. (If Michelangelo had been caught and executed for dissecting dead bodies, he could not have designed the Vatican, nor painted the Sistine Chapel.) The DNA research which gave us artificial insulin for diabetics was opposed, as were anesthetics for operating rooms, vaccines for polio and tuberculosis; even x-rays were argued against on the grounds they might be used to see through women's clothing! A person's faith may determine his or her decision on accepting medication (some refuse blood transfusions, for example) but should never be allowed to forbid medical benefits to others.
Don Reed
www.stemcellbattles
Don C. Reed is co-chair of Californians for Cures, and writes for their web blog, www.stemcellbattles
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