LIFE DIGEST: Biotech firm hopes for OK on embryonic trials
- Oct 28, 2008
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) may permit clinical trials using embryonic stem cells to begin within three months, a biotechnology firm has reported.
Tom Okarma, president of Geron Corp., said Oct. 15 the firm has been working to overcome a hold placed by the FDA on the company’s application for a trial with human beings on a compound procured from embryonic stem cells to treat spinal cord injuries, according to a weblog on The Scientist’s Internet site. The FDA placed a hold in May on the application. Geron has sought to “educate” the FDA on its methods, Okarma said.
The FDA’s review process is nearly complete, and it may drop the hold within the next three months, Okarma told The Scientist, which is a magazine on the life sciences.
A Southern Baptist bioethicist says, however, that review won’t solve at least one major problem.
“Clinical trials using human embryos destroyed for their stem cells present a monumental ethical obstacle,” said C. Ben Mitchell, a professor of bioethics and contemporary culture at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School in suburban Chicago. “Living human beings are purposefully killed in order to test medical treatments for other human beings.
“Geron and their cheerleaders may try to spin it another way, but that is precisely what’s going on. And as they grasp for hope, individuals suffering from terrible illnesses are being tempted to become complicit in the destruction. If an effective therapy eventually does emerge, people with pro-life consciences will have to refuse treatment. The whole scenario is grotesque.
“The FDA evaluates two things: safety and effectiveness,” said Mitchell, a consultant on biomedical and life issues for the Southern Baptist Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission. “No matter how effective, embryo-destructive stem cell research can never be safe for the embryos who are destroyed.
“I’m certain this news will come as a surprise to many people who have been led to believe that there must be dozens, if not hundreds, of embryonic stem cell trials going on. Despite the unprecedented hype, embryonic stem cells have been a notorious failure clinically. Adult stem cells are currently being used therapeutically and are showing enormous promise for future healing and cures.”
Embryonic stem cells have yet to treat any diseases in human beings and have been plagued by the development of tumors in lab animals. Unlike research using embryos, extracting stem cells from non-embryonic sources—such as umbilical cord blood, placentas, fat and bone marrow—has nearly universal support. Such research has produced treatments for at least 73 human ailments, according to Do No Harm, a coalition promoting ethics in research.
The federal government funds non-embryonic stem cell research, but, based on a decision by President Bush, refuses to provide grants for stem cell research that results in the destruction of human embryos.
Estimate: Abortion has cost America $35 trillion
The United States not only has lost about 50.5 million children to abortion since it was legalized, but the result has been a $35 trillion loss to its economy, a pro-life advocate has estimated.
Dennis Howard, founder of Movement for a Better America, has been researching abortion’s economic impact since 1995, he said. His organization arrived at the $35 trillion estimate by studying what the babies who have been killed through abortion since it became legal would have contributed to the American economy in terms of gross domestic product.
The loss grows to $70 trillion when human beings lost to sterilization and abortifacients such as RU 486 and the intrauterine device (IUD) are counted, Howard said in a mid-October column.
“No matter how you slice it, aggressive ‘population control’ exacts a huge price in future economic growth that can never be recovered,” Howard wrote. “Indeed, it is a loss that reverberates through all future generations. Without an enormous new Baby Boom lasting 40 or 50 years, that growth is lost forever. We don’t have a debt crisis. We have a death crisis.”
The most significant factor in solving the crisis is to recognize “families are the fundamental social and economic unit of society for the simple, but profound, reason that they are the source of all supply and demand,” he said.
Polls vary widely on California parental notice initiative
A California ballot initiative to require parental notification for an underage girl’s abortion either has a comfortable lead or basically no advantage at all, depending on which public opinion survey is cited.
Likely voters in the Nov. 4 election favor Proposition 4 by 52 to 33 percent, according to an Oct. 22 release from the Marist College Institute for Public Opinion. The Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) reported on the same date, however, the initiative leads among likely voters by only two percent, 46 to 44, with a margin of error of three percent.
Prop 4 would apply to females under the age of 18 and would mandate they wait until 48 hours after a parent is notified before having an abortion.
The percentage of voters favoring Prop 4 has declined since September, according to PPIC. At that time, 48 percent supported the measure.
The Marist poll was conducted from Sept. 28 to Oct. 5 for the Knights of Columbus, a Roman Catholic men’s organization. The PPIC survey was performed Oct. 12-19.
S.D. voters split evenly on abortion ban measure
South Dakota voters are divided evenly on a Nov. 4 ballot initiative that would prohibit most abortions in the state.
Among likely voters, 44 percent favored Measure 11, while 44 opposed it, according to a public opinion survey sponsored by the Argus Leader and KELO, a newspaper and television station in Sioux Falls, S.D. The poll showed 12 percent are undecided, the Argus Leader reported.
Measure 11 would ban abortions, except in the cases of a threat to the mother’s life, a “serious risk of substantial and irreversible impairment of the functioning of a major bodily organ or system,” rape or incest.
The survey, which was conducted Oct. 13-15, has a margin of error of 3.5 percent, according to the Argus Leader.
Assisted suicide initiative heavily favored in Washington
A Washington ballot initiative to legalize physician-assisted suicide has a hefty lead, according to a recent public opinion survey.
Registered voters favor Initiative 1000 by 56 to 38 percent, based on a University of Washington public opinion poll, LifeNews.com reported. Six percent are undecided, according to the survey.
If approved by voters Nov. 4, Initiative 1000 would bring Oregon-like assisted suicide to Washington. Assisted suicide became legal in Oregon in 1997, making it the only state in the country to permit the practice. Legalized assisted suicide enables doctors to prescribe lethal doses of drugs for a patient but not to administer them.
The poll, which was conducted Oct. 18-26, has a margin of error of 4 percent, according to LifeNews.
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Further Learning
Learn more about: Life, Abortion, Stem-Cell Research, Suicide