Stem Cells of a feather…
By Miguel Guanipa (01/09/06)
If you are like me, when you hear stem cell research related terms like nuclear transfer and cellular differentiation you usually start looking at your watch and thinking of an exit strategy. Besides, it’s much easier to ostensibly engage in coffee table banter like the messianic properties of embryonic stem cells that will some day help Parkinson’s disease sufferers stop shaking and make paraplegics walk again; and how anyone who opposes this kind of revolutionary type of research surely must be grossly misinformed about the extraordinary discoveries made by the scientific community is the last few years. After all, what heartless creature would dare deny scientists their god given right to have unlimited access to these resources so that they can alleviate the suffering of these poor souls?
As I gather, embryonic stem cells (E.S.) are the earliest cells that produce from a fertilized egg. Fertilized eggs are usually created promptly on the evening after most wedding receptions. Therapeutic cloning is a very clever euphemism that scientists use for the creation and harvesting of human embryos in order to extract these E.S. cells which have alleged miraculous powers. The problem is, by extracting these nascent cells the Embryo is terminated.
Conversely, adult stem (A.S.) cells can be extracted from the bone marrow, blood vessels, skeletal muscle, skin and liver of those of us who have to take our chances outside of the once coveted safety of the womb. A.S. cells have been widely used with very promising results in hospitals world wide. These types of stem cells have been in use since 1990 to treat heart and other metabolic diseases in children like Hurler syndrome and acute lymphocytic leukemia with very promising results.
It is not conclusive if E.S. cells are able to fully integrate into the tissue of an organism without exhibiting severe undesirable properties like tumors or being targeted for destruction by that organism’s immune system. In recent years scientists have begun to recognize that A.S. cells may be more flexible than first thought. The advantage of using stem cells from an adult is that the patient's own cells can be coaxed into specialized regenerative mode and reintroduced into the patient’s tissue thereby avoiding rejection by his or her immune system. Additionally, these A.S. cells do not produce malignant growths when integrated.
Hence some scientists are recognizing that the grandiose promises made by E.S. cell research are very much into the distant future, if at all, while A.S. cells are already showing tremendous results when compared with the relatively equal amount of research time that has been devoted to both.
Nevertheless, there is no denying that E.S. cell research has gotten the lion’s share of media attention.
But why this seemingly unwarranted attention for a type of research which has yielded far from promising results, while its less shady cousin, A.S. cell research, gets relatively so little attention? Why has E.S. cell research been hailed as the miracle cure of the future even when so little empirical evidence has been gathered from this line of research? How can this unsupported scientific speculation warrant such high praise?
I believe part of the answer is that the inflated promises which have been made by scientists on this field tend to attract well meaning philanthropists as well as some very inflated egos. Sometimes these inflated egos come in the shape of very generous private donors who probably harbor a secret desire to claim someday that they took part in jogging the very hand of God by making a preemptive bid over his sovereignty. Few would argue that no price is too high for such a deific enterprise. Enter the self-serving celebrity attention that is amply paid to this fantastic endeavor often lauded by serious looking people who wear thin rimmed glasses and read very thick books.
People like Hwang Soo-suk, a South Korean veterinarian who was brought to world acclaim in May of 2005 after he showed the world the results of his work in which he had allegedly cloned a human embryo.
It is not hard to see why Mr. Soo-suk felt pressured to bring some results to the world in the area of E.S. cell research. In his first experiment in 2004 it took a total of 242 human eggs to come up with one satisfactory result that would support the viability of so called therapeutic cloning. In this particular experiment, which turned out to be fraudulent, Mr. Soo-suk allegedly only sacrificed 10 eggs.
Presently the harried veterinarian is undergoing treatment for stress and said to have suffered a tremendous amount of anguish and public humiliation. There’s no word as to how the dog he cloned, is doing.
But I wonder if his sense of shame is derived from the fact that he allowed the prospect of world acclaim to cloud his judgment and compromise his integrity, or if he is simply upset that he was caught in a lie? After all, this is a man who from the beginning of his research had engaged in the unethical practice of coercively procuring the eggs for his research from a couple of his own assistants; a practice which is strictly prohibited by law. Can you picture a Schwarzenegger type asking his victims: Your eggs…Give them to me. Anyway, back to my point.
What supporters of E.S. cell researchers will rather not talk about is that the type of cloning which is needed to achieve the viable transfer of these type of cells is fraught with difficulties -as evidenced by Mr. Soo-Suk’s results- and is typically estimated at being successful only about 4% of the time.
But an untainted success of Mr. Soo-suk’s experiment could have meant a catalyst to a full throttle pursuit of E.S. cell research its supporters are itching to see, as well as the unrestricted access to the coffers of the federal government. And they would like nothing more than to discuss the matter in terms of the much debated question of life’s true begining. That debate could easily be cast as a religious debate which would ipso facto make the argument moot.
But a fertilized egg, the sacrificial lamb from which E.S. cells are drawn, is an organism that remains genetically the same through infancy, childhood and adulthood despite its change in appearance. It should be remembered that this is not an assertion which is up for acceptance or rejection based upon one's own personal religious inclination. This is a scientific fact that is simply not open to debate. One is free to deny that fact, but that makes it no less of a fact.
Those who unreservedly support E.S. cell research are only waiting for the answer to one pivotal question: at which point may this life be declared disposable so that it can be readily exploited for spare parts; which means that in the area of how much a generation values the sanctity of life, history may be repeating itself.
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