Obama lifts limit on embryonic stem cell research, scientists hail

2009-03-09 23:52:14

by Xinhua writer Ren Haijun

WASHINGTON, March 9 (Xinhua) --

U.S. President Barack Obama on Monday issued an executive order that allows federal money to fund expanded embryonic stem cell research, which scientists say is "a great advance for science in general and America in particular."

Before signing the order, Obama said he was ending what he believed was "a false choice between sound science and moral values." The president vowed that the U.S. government "will vigorously support scientists who pursue this research," and "will aim for America to lead the world in the discoveries it one day may yield."

The majority of Americans -- from across the political spectrum, and of all backgrounds and beliefs -- have come to a consensus that we should pursue this research, the president said.

"That the potential it offers is great, and with proper guidelines and strict oversight, the perils can be avoided," he noted.

He called on Congress to provide the needed funding even as he asserted the order would never allow human cloning.

"We will ensure that our government never opens the door to the use of cloning for human reproduction," he said in the White House ceremony where he was joined by scientists and other supports of the research." It is dangerous, profoundly wrong, and has no place in our society, or any society."

The decision was a clear repudiation of the approach taken by Obama's predecessor, George W. Bush. U.S. law limits the use of federal money to make human stem cells, but Bush tightened the restrictions even further to include work using such cells.

In 2001, former President George W. Bush limited federal funding for stem cell research only to human embryonic stem cell lines that already existed. It was a gesture to his conservative Christian supporters who regard embryonic stem cell research as destroying potential life, because the cells must be extracted from human embryos, which they view as human life. Stem cell researchers say that policy held back scientific advances and the development of cures.

Bush's decision prompted charges that he was basing his decision on politics and religion rather than science. Religious conservatives who supported Bush generally opposed embryonic stem cell research because it involves destruction of embryos.

Obama rejected that view. "As a person of faith, I believe we are called to care for each other and work to ease human suffering. I believe we have been given the capacity and will to pursue this research -- and the humanity and conscience to do so responsibly."

"President Obama's executive order signals a new day in which science policy will be based on science and in which the federal government can invest in the best ideas with the greatest potential to improve public health. America will once again seek to be the world's engine for biomedical discovery," Sean J. Morrison told Xinhua in an email, who is the director of Center for Stem Cell Biology in the University of Michigan.

George Daley of the Harvard Stem Cell Institute and Children's Hospital of Boston, a leading stem cell researcher, also told Xinhua that the stem cell research community applaud the decision." It will make more tools available to us to investigate the origins of disease, and will lay a foundation for finding new drugs and delivering cells as medicines. As funding is the lifeblood of our research, the president's decision will now allow us to compete for federal dollars, which will jump-start our research program."

"With the new policy, I expect the U.S. to move ever faster towards leading the world in stem cell research."

"This will definitely boost stem cell research -- not only in the US, but worldwide. This is a new era for stem cell research. It not only impacts research in the laboratory, but even more importantly, it finally lifts the black cloud that has hovered over this research for so long," said Robert Lanza, Chief Scientific Officer of Massachusetts-based Advanced Cell Technology, a stem cell company. He told Xinhua that the president's decision will also help jump-start investment in the private sector as well.

"I view reversal of the Bush Administration's 2001 policy as an essential step to maximize the efficiency of bringing embryonic stem cell therapies to the clinic," said David Goldhamer, director of Center for Regenerative Biology in the University of Connecticut.

"There is no question that this will boost U.S. research in embryonic stem cells."

Though Obama signed the order, laws are still on the books that limit the use of federal money to actually make the powerful stem cells, because they must be taken from human embryos. So federal research money can be used only to work with cells that were made using other sources of funds.

Embryonic stem cells are cells contained in embryos that have the ability to transform themselves into virtually any other type of cell in the body. They are called pluripotent. It is this quality that enables the tiny embryo to develop into a fully formed body. About five days after fertilization, the human embryo becomes a blastocyst -- a hollow sphere of about 100 cells. Cells in its outer layer go on to form the placenta and other organs needed to support fetal development in the uterus. The inner cellsgo on to form nearly all of the tissues of the body. These are the embryonic stem cells used in research.

Editor: Yan

Schwarzenegger applauds Obama for repealing Bush's policy on stem cell research

2009-03-10 06:55:06

LOS ANGELES, March 9 (Xinhua) --

California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger on Monday applauded President Barack Obama for lifting funding ban on stem cell research.

"President Obama's executive order is a huge win for the millions of people who suffer from spinal cord injuries, diabetes, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, Multiple Sclerosis and many other illnesses," Schwarzenegger said in a statement.

"Californians were the first in the nation to support and fund embryonic stem cell research and we are big believers in the power of this revolutionary science to not only improve but to save lives."

Because of the federal ban, Californians world-renown research facilities have had to have separate areas for the federally-funded and the non-federally funded programs, causing duplicative efforts, according to the governor.

Earlier on Monday, Obama abolished contentious Bush-era restraints on stem-cell research, declaring that "our government has forced what I believe is a false choice between sound science and moral values."

"I applaud President Obama for removing this barrier which allows California to maximize critical research funding so we can continue to lead the world in stem cell research," Schwarzenegger said.

In 2004, Schwarzenegger championed and California voters passed Proposition 71, devoting an unprecedented 3 billion U.S. dollars to stem cell research and creating the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM).

To date, CIRM has awarded 635 million dollars in research and facility construction grants that is leveraging over 1 billion dollars in private funds, making it the largest source of funding for embryonic and pluripotent stem cell research in the world.

In response to then President Bush's veto of legislation to provide federal funding for embryonic stem cell research in 2006, the governor directed the state to issue a loan of up to 150 million dollars to strengthen California's voter-approved stem cell research efforts that offer the potential for new treatments for debilitating and deadly diseases.

Obama opens up stem cell work, science inquiries

By SETH BORENSTEIN and BEN FELLER

Associated Press Writers

Mar 9, 2009, 9:20 PM EDT

WASHINGTON (AP) --

From tiny embryonic cells to the large-scale physics of global warming, President Barack Obama urged researchers on Monday to follow science and not ideology as he abolished contentious Bush-era restraints on stem-cell research. "Our government has forced what I believe is a false choice between sound science and moral values," Obama declared as he signed documents changing U.S. science policy and removing what some researchers have said were shackles on their work.

"It is about ensuring that scientific data is never distorted or concealed to serve a political agenda - and that we make scientific decisions based on facts, not ideology," Obama said.

Researchers said the new president's message was clear: Science, which once propelled men to the moon, again matters in American life.

Opponents saw it differently: a defeat for morality in the most basic questions of life and death.

"The action by the president today will, in effect, allow scientists to create their own guidelines without proper moral restraints," Family Research Council President Tony Perkins said.

In a crowded ornate East Room, there were more scientists in the White House than Alan Leshner, CEO of the American Association for the Advancement of Science had seen in his 30 years in Washington. "More happy scientists than I've seen," he added.

The most immediate effect will allow federally funded researchers to use hundreds of new embryonic stem cell lines for promising, but still long-range research in hopes of creating better treatments, possibly even cures, for conditions ranging from diabetes to paralysis. Until now, those researchers had to limit themselves to just 21 stem cell lines created before August 2001, when President George W. Bush limited funding because of "fundamental questions about the beginnings of life and the ends of science."

Science, politics and religion have long intertwined and conflicted with each other. In his actions Monday, especially with the stem cell decision, Obama is emphasizing more the science than the religion, when compared with his predecessor, science policy experts say. But they acknowledged politics is still involved.

Don't expect stem cell cures or treatments anytime soon. One company this summer will begin the world's first study of a treatment using human embryonic stem cells, in people who recently suffered spinal cord injuries. Research institutions on Monday were gearing up to ask for more freely flowing federal money, and the National Institutes of Health was creating guidelines on how to hand it out and include ethical constraints. It will be months before the stem cell money flows; the average NIH stem cell grant is $1.5 million spread out over four years.

Scientists focused on a new sense of freedom.

"I think patients everywhere will be cheering us on, imploring us to work faster, harder and with all of our ability to find new treatments," said Harvard Stem Cell Institute co-director Doug Melton, father of two children with Type I diabetes who could possibly be treated with stem cells. "On a personal level, it is an enormous relief and a time for celebration. ... Science thrives when there is an open and collaborative exchange, not when there are artificial barriers, silos, constructed by the government."

Opponents framed their opposition mostly, but not exclusively, on moral grounds and the scientifically contested claims that adult stem cells work just as well.

Said Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America: "President Obama's order places the worst kind of politics above ethics. Politics driven by hype makes overblown promises, fuels the desperation of the suffering and financially benefits those seeking to strip morality from science."

In Congress, Reps. Diana DeGette, D-Colo., and Mike Castle, R-Del., said they would seek a quick vote on legislation to codify Obama's order in federal law, after failing twice in the past to overturn Bush's restrictions. DeGette said she doesn't want stem cell research to become "a pingpong ball going back and forth between administrations."

But Rep. Tom Price, R-Ga., chairman of the Republican study committee, said the president's new policy would "force taxpayers to subsidize research that will destroy human embryos." De Gette and Castle said their legislation tries to minimize destruction of embryos.

Stem cells are typically derived from fertility clinic surplus, destined for destruction.

Obama also said the stem cell policy is designed so that it "never opens the door to the use of cloning for human reproduction." Such cloning, he said, "is dangerous, profoundly wrong, and has no place in our society or any society."

In addition to the stem cell order, Obama issued a memo designed to ensure openness about scientific research and give whistleblower protection to scientists.

Promoting science "is about letting scientists like those here today do their jobs, free from manipulation or coercion, and listening to what they tell us, even when it's inconvenient - especially when it's inconvenient," Obama said.

Science and politics often conflict, said Granger Morgan, professor of engineering and public policy at Carnegie Mellon University and a former science advisory board chairman for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency - perhaps illustrated no more wildly than in 1897 when the Indiana legislature attempted to change the mathematical concept of pi to 3.2. Science should provide the facts that politicians use for their decisions, Morgan and Leshner said.

Many scientists and environmental activists complained that the Bush administration had censored and marginalized science. That's a perception that Bush science adviser John Marburger repeatedly called untrue and unfair, as he addressed a series of occurrences that troubled critics.

In 2006, the White House edited out congressional testimony about public health effects of global warming by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Julie Gerberding. A 2003 EPA global warming document was edited by nonscientists at the White House. A NASA political appointee tried - and failed - to silence the agency's top climate scientist.

Former Surgeon General Richard Carmona resigned in 2006, complaining about White House interference on global health issues: "The problem with this approach is that in public health, as in democracy, there is nothing worse than ignoring science or marginalizing the voice of science for reasons driven by changing political winds."

Obama advisers contend that all has changed. The government has already put on hold rules about scientific input on endangered species, reinstating advice that had been excised during the Bush administration.

Public policy must "be guided by sound scientific advice," said Dr. Harold Varmus, the Nobel Prize-winning co-chairman of the President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. The new memo Obama signed is "mainly a way of trying to prevent tampering with any advice," Varmus told MSNBC.

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Associated Press writers Lauran Neergaard, Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar and Philip Elliott contributed to this report.

Stem cell decision exposes religious divides

By ERIC GORSKI AP Religion Writer

AP, Mar 9, 2009, 9:20 PM EDT

The embryonic stem cell research debate is steeped with religious arguments, with some faith traditions convinced the research amounts to killing innocent life, others citing the moral imperative to alleviate suffering, and plenty of religious believers caught somewhere in between.

President Barack Obama's order Monday opening the door for federal taxpayer dollars to fund expanded embryonic stem cell research again brings those often colliding interests to the fore.

Cardinal Justin Rigali, chairman of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops' Committee on Pro-Life Activities, called Obama's move "a sad victory of politics over science and ethics."

"This action is morally wrong because it encourages the destruction of innocent human life, treating vulnerable human beings as mere products to be harvested," Rigali, the archbishop of Philadelphia, said in a statement.

On the other side is the Rev. Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite, a United Church of Christ minister and a professor at Chicago Theological Seminary.

"There is an ethical imperative to relieve suffering and promote healing," she said. "This is good policy for a religiously pluralistic society that cares about human suffering and the relief of human suffering."

Obama alluded to religion in announcing the changes, saying, "As a person of faith, I believe we are called to care for each other and work to ease human suffering. I believe we have been given the capacity and will to pursue this research and the humanity and conscience to do so responsibly."

Some religious traditions teach that because life begins at conception, any research that destroys a human embryo, as this research does, is tantamount to murder and is never justified. The Roman Catholic Church and the Southern Baptist Convention are among those that oppose the research.

Other more liberal traditions, including mainline Protestant and Jewish institutions, believe the promise to relieve suffering is paramount. In 2004, the governing body of the Episcopal Church said it would favor the research as long as it used embryos that otherwise would have been destroyed, that embryos were not created for research purposes, or were not bought and sold.

Under Jewish law, an embryo is genetic material that does not have the status of a person. According to the Talmud, the embryo is "simply water" in the first 40 days of gestation. Healing and preserving human life takes precedence over all the other commandments in Judaism.

Some groups and faiths are divided on the issue. Muslims disagree over - among other things - whether an embryo in the early stage of development has a soul. The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or the Mormon church, has not taken a position.

The Rev. Joel Hunter, an evangelical pastor from Orlando, Fla., who serves on an Obama White House advisory panel, said he was encouraged by Monday's developments.

"The principle is still that it's not only understandable but in some ways moral to use embryonic stem cells that are destined for destruction for research for helping people," he said. "I think we have to tread very lightly and very carefully, and I think we have to be vigilant for years to come."

But most evangelicals criticized Obama's move. Gilbert Meilaender, a Christian ethicist at Valparaiso University and a member of the President's Council on Bioethics, created by President George W. Bush, said Obama's decision was especially disappointing because scientists are advancing toward being able to produce cells that act like embryonic stem cells without destroying any human embryos.

Meilaender said that while there is no good solution for frozen embryos left in storage at fertility clinics, destroying them for stem cell research is not the answer.

"My own position is that having, as it were, produced and used them once in the use of someone else's project, for a reproductive purpose, that using it once for someone else's purpose is enough," said Meilaender, a member of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod.

Catholic bishops have been outspoken in opposing embryonic stem cell research. Other Catholics, though, are more open to lifting the Bush-era restrictions, with caveats. The Rev. Tom Reese, a senior fellow at the Woodstock Theological Center at Georgetown University, said restrictions should be put on embryonic stem cell research - including prohibition on their buying and selling, and using only embryos that otherwise would be destroyed.

"I'm trying to make an argument for some middle ground here," Reese said. "Hopefully down the line we can reach a point where we don't have to use embryonic stem cell research."

Polls show some believers are willing to buck their leaders on the issue. Fifty-nine percent of white, non-Hispanic Catholics and 58 percent of white mainline Protestants favor embryonic stem cell research, according to a poll released in July 2008 by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life. Only 31 percent of white evangelical Protestants, however, favored the research.

Princeton University politics professor Robert George, a Catholic and another member of the Bush-era Council on Bioethics, said the moral argument over embryonic stem cell research is not rooted in religion but in ethics and equality. He said research shows that an embryo is a human being in its earliest form of development, so we have to ask ourselves whether all human life should be treated equally, with dignity and respect.

"I don't think the question has anything to do with religion or pulling out our microscope and trying to find souls," George said. "We live in a pluralistic society where some people believe there are no such things as souls. Does that mean we should not have moral objections to killing 17-year-old adolescents?"

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