The Embryonic Stem Cell Dilemma

Monday was a landmark in our national policy on science and ethics. President Obama reversed President Bush's freeze on NIH funding on embryonic stem cells. The freeze only affected research on stem cells from embryos and only made a restriction on federal funding. There were several other stem cell projects funded by the NIH and any project could still conduct research on embryonic stem cells, just without federal funding.

As a person with a disability I identify with people who have hope in the potential of stem cell treatment. Trials in petri dishes, lab mice, and even humans are promising. Even when I was first paralyzed in 1994, my doctors were aggressively studying stem cells (they were called Schwann cells). Hope is a potent element that can rally people in vulnerable conditions to a cause. Stem cell research has a following of vulnerable people (sometimes desperate, other times sympathetic) appalled at any limits on its use. At this point I cannot agree.

President Bush's limit was initiated because there is a genuine belief by many that the destruction of an embryo is the destruction of a potential human. There are many arguments for taking advantage of embryos in fertilization clinics and even creating embryos for the purpose of destruction to harvest stem cells.

There is so much opportunity without these embryonic cell lines. There are opportunities to continue in the current direction. This research takes years to develop into reliable treatment. I stand behind the funding limit on the destruction of embryos. I admonish other to step back and consider the larger argument: whether the creation and destruction of a potential person is justified by the relief of people today.