The Stem Cell Debate get hotter – and what we need to do about it

Nancy Reagan’s recent intervention in the debate over federal funding of destructive embryo stem-cell research has given fresh heart to those pressure groups, celebrities and biotech enthusiasts who are seeking to overturn President Bush’s careful policy compromise – which he announced to the nation in his first televised broadcast as president, on August 9, 2001.

It is plain that the administration is not going to change its policy. What we need to understand is that there is so much misunderstanding abroad that it is proving very difficult for honest people to come to honest conclusions. The press is now focusing on the alleged fact that “conservatives” in the religious community are changing their view. Perhaps some are. Many have never thought seriously about this matter, and are anxious about sick relatives and the need to cure diseases. It’s never been more important for those of us who have thought long and hard about these issues to get the word out and clarify the thinking of the nation.

Here are some of the very common misunderstanding; some of them deliberately – shamelessly - purveyed by the press and advocates of destructive embryo research.

The Bush administration has banned stem cell research.

There is no federal law banning stem cell research of any kind. There has long been a ban – imposed by Congress – on federal funding of destructive embryo research. This ban was enforced by the Clinton administration. President Bush’s decision of August 2001 was in fact a liberalization of that ban – and it was denounced by some conservative groups as a result! The Bush decision permitted funding of embryo stem cell research. The permission extended to cell-lines cultured from embryos that had already been destroyed, so that there would be no encouragement to destroy further embryos – but the basic research could be funded. And, of course, there is no restriction at all on “adult” stem cell research.

Cures are right around the corner if only the administration changes its mind.

One of the cruelest myths ever put out in the press is this one. Whatever has been said, the implication is clear: aunts and uncles and parents who are now sick could be cured; perhaps even President Reagan could have been saved; all that stands in the way is this funding ban.

It does not take a lot of intelligence to see the many fallacies here. Even the more honest advocates of embryo stem cell research have admitted that “cures” are a long, long way off. This is patently clear to those who have followed the animal experiments, which have so far yielded very little evidence of “cures” and many problems. But the proof lies in the market place. If the hype were to be believed, and a whole new world of cures were on our doorstep, there would be massive investment from venture capitalists and major Pharma corporations and start-up IPOs, pouring into embryo stem cell work – the new gold rush. Economics is an interesting study: the market places values on information, summing up all that there is out there and coming to conclusions that lead to prices, assessments of risk, and to investments. The markets have spoken: the best-informed people around, the biotech investors, have taken a walk. And, of course, that is why there is such pressure for public money.

Adult stem cells are second best.

I gave an invited presentation at the vast Experimental Biology conference in Washington, DC, a few weeks ago. I was surveying the ethical pros and cons of stem cell research, and alongside me were three other speakers: my friend Professor David Prentice, an adult stem cell expert, who summed up the state of the science in both adult and embryo research areas; and two famed experts, one working in each field. The embryo research expert talked about basic research. The adult stem cell expert (who was not against embryo work in principle) talked about patients with what had been thought to be incurable diseases going home from hospital cured. (If you want to read some of the latest research info, go to stemcellresearch.org – and tell your friends, pastor, physician, neighbors, local newspaper, congressman, kids, sick relatives, state representatives, mailman – tell them all to go there and read the facts.)

They only want to use the “spare” embryos that will die anyway.

Tell that to the marines! The entire celebrity led, emotionally-driven case for using embryos for research has been built on the idea that it will result in one-on-one medications, using embryo-derived tissue to regenerate and replace tissue cells that have gone bad. This is what has been deceitfully called “therapeutic cloning,” and involves the mass-production of embryos by the hundreds of millions – and the production of an identical twin for each patient so that the twin embryo can be destroyed to produce the “cure.” This idea is horrific, and the horror is by no means confined to pro-lifers!

In fact, “therapeutic cloning” has already been banned by law in many countries. The Germans, who know a thing or two about where science can go wrong, banned it back in 1990. Australia banned it last year. The latest was Canada, where the ban was finalized in April of this year. The French are next in line: we expect their law to be voted through later in June. The US is among many countries supporting Costa Rica in an attempt to get an international convention banning cloning through the UN. Among the big democracies, only the UK is in favor of “therapeutic cloning,” and the UK has been in the pro-embryo-research lead for 25 years. Here in the US, the Brownback-Landrieu bill to ban cloning is languishing in the Senate. But remember, its equivalent (Weldon-Stupak) has twice passed the House with a huge bipartisan majority.

So the “spare embryo” argument is a red herring. In any case, these embryos should be adopted and given a chance of life. And we should stop freezing embryos. This is not a proper use of the God’s gift of life, to be stored in deep-frozen vats like some kind of.

So what can we do?

We need to get these arguments and the facts behind them into our local media and our local politicians mailbags and offices. We need to get them out through the churches. One of the greatest debates of our generation – some would say, the greatest – is the struggle for human dignity in the face of these amazing, and potentially terrible, new technologies. Pro-life Christians need to be in the forefront, and that means all of us!

Use those special websites: cloninginformation.org, and stemcellresearch.org.

Use the PLAYING GOD? Sunday School materials – in which Chuck Colson and I explain these debates – with your church or home group or just your friends.

Look for the new book, HUMAN DIGNITY IN THE BIOTECH CENTURY, which Chuck and I have edited and which brings together some of the best brains to make our case (coming from InterVarsity Press in July).

And, whatever your politics, support President Bush’s stem cell funding policy.

Nigel M. de S. Cameron
Director, Council for Biotechnology Policy
Wilberforce Forum