AFTER months of soul-searching, the US National Institutes of Health has set
out guidelines that will allow researchers to apply for public funds to work
with stem cells derived from human embryos. Publicly funded researchers will at
last be able to join those in industry who are developing ways to grow new
tissue and organs for transplant, from patients鈥� own tissue or from
鈥渙ff-the-shelf鈥� tissue banks.
Embryonic stem cells are a type of primordial cell that can be coaxed to grow
into any other type of cell. Many oppose their use because they must initially
be harvested from an embryo, which is inevitably destroyed in the process.
Proposals for legal changes isssued in Britain last month go further than the
new American rules, as they would allow researchers to extract stem cells from embryos
(快猫短视频, 19 August, p 4).
鈥淭here will be some experiments that people have in mind that they can鈥檛 do that they could do in
Britain,鈥� says Paul Berg of Stanford University in California.
In the US, researchers will not be allowed to work with human stem cells
generated by cloning, which involves taking genetic material from an adult cell
and putting it in a fertilised egg. Also, public funds will not support
harvesting stem cells from embryos, so researchers will have to buy them from
private labs.
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鈥淚 happen to think that this is wrong. I think we should be funding the
establishment of embryonic stem cell lines,鈥� says John Gearhart of Johns Hopkins
University in Baltimore. Gearhart, who plans to apply for public funding, led
one of two private groups that in 1998 managed to isolate and grow human
embryonic stem cells.
Despite the limitations of the new guidelines, numerous scientific
organisations welcome them as they are expected to open up the field to more
research and greater public oversight. 鈥淭he most significant consequence is that
the work is going to move forward rapidly,鈥� says Gearhart. He predicts that in
as little as three years, therapies based on embryonic stem cells may be
beginning clinical trials for conditions such as spinal cord injuries.
The guidelines have to conform to a law that prohibits government funding of
research that destroys embryos. But anti-abortion activists, and even some
pro-choice groups, say they run counter to the spirit of the law. 鈥淓ven the
President鈥檚 own bioethics advisory board has said that it鈥檚 disingenuous,鈥� says
David Prentice of Indiana State University. He points out that stem cells taken
from adults retain many of the properties of embryonic stem cells and studying
them raises no ethical issues.
When Congress reconvenes next month, the Senate is expected to vote on a bill
allowing public funding to harvest stem cells. But senators who oppose stem cell
research are expected to sponsor competing bills to scupper the change.