Crib Sheet: Stem Cell Research

What we’re set to lose from Bush’s veto.

By Alix Rogers, University of Pennsylvania

President George W. Bush has enacted his first ever veto against the bi-partisan bill H.R. 810: The Stem Cell Research Enhancement Act. This bill would fuel medical research stalled by the current administration’s policy, research which most scientists believe could lead to cures for a wide range of diseases and debilitating conditions, such as paralysis, multiple sclerosis, and Parkinson’s Disease. Passed with 63 votes in the Senate and 238 votes in the House, Congress is likely to fall short of the 2/3 majority needed to override a presidential veto. This means that embryonic stem cell research will continue to be hampered across the country. As young Americans, we should be particularly concerned about this issue. It is one which will ultimately have great impact on us and our health care.

The current policy is preventing cures from being developed, cures which our generation is the most likely to benefit from, because it will be several years before we begin to see clinical applications. Embryonic stem cells could be used to cure a wide variety of diseases including Alzheimer’s, Diabetes, and spinal cord injuries. A recent John’s Hopkins University study in which researchers used embryonic stem cells to enable paralyzed rats to walk highlight some of the potential medical breakthroughs.

President Bush has claimed that adult stem cells are a more promising avenue of research, because they are already being used in the clinical setting. This argument is absurd in light of the fact that the majority of available treatments involving adult stem cells, such as bone marrow transplants, do not involve complicated attempts to differentiate the cells into specific types of body cells. On the other hand, transforming an embryonic stem cell into a heart or nerve cell is an extremely complicated process that will take substantial time and research—and money. For 2007 the National Institutes of Health (NIH) earmarked only $39 million for human embryonic stem cell (ES) research, while adult stem cell research received $200 million. Adult stem cells have more developed medical applications because they are easier to work with and have received more funding, not because they have more potential. More importantly, an extended time frame is no reason to bar a path of medical research. If we invest in ES research now, it may offer useful treatment by the time members of our generation begins to develop Alzheimer’s.

The second problem is that America has a declining crop of researchers and is driving away its best minds. Current policies are causing prominent researchers to accept positions in other countries that support their research. Already reports have been issued that show how America is losing its standing in embryonic stem cell research. But what is more disturbing is that many budding scientists are discouraged from entering the field of stem cell research. While testifying to a Senate sub-committee, James Battey, Chair of the NIH Stem Cell Taskforce, said “young people are now electing to stay away from human ES research.” Elizabeth Nabel, director of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, has also said, “The restricted access (to embryonic stem cells) will hamper the NIH’s ability to recruit…young scientists.” This gap is one reason that all of the first round grants given by the state of California as part of its $3 billion investment in stem cell research went to “multi-year training grants to increase the number of young investigators (pre-doctoral, post-doctoral, and clinical fellows) with the technical and academic skills necessary to conduct basic and applied stem cell research.” Because young scientists are discouraged from entering the field now, America will have few researchers with the experience and expertise to work with embryonic stem cells, even if the policy is reversed.

So with the potential benefits of pursuing ES research being so great, and the potential costs of not doing so equally significant, why is it so controversial? It’s because, despite the fact that human embryonic stem cell research involves a ball of cells in a Petri dish that has no developed nervous system, there are certain groups who believe that because the derivation of human embryonic stem cells involves the destruction of nascent human life. So, for the same reason that almost all the same people oppose reproductive freedom for women, they believe embryonic stem cell research should be prohibited (or at a minimum that the government shouldn’t fund it.) Seventy-two percent of Americans support embryonic stem cell research, but federal policy is being held hostage by the small minority who oppose it.

On August 9, 2001, President Bush announced his restrictive policy of limiting federal funding for embryonic stem cell research to stem cell lines derived before that day. As science has advanced, it is being increasingly hampered by these conservative policies. Problems such as a lack of access to the federal lines, contamination by mouse feeder cells in which the stem cells grow, and a lack of genetic diversity have plagued federal researchers and caused concern over their ability to use these lines for clinical trials in human patients. These problems are also paired with a general lack of funding for stem cell research by the NIH.

The lack of opportunity, support, and funding provided by the federal government is especially egregious because the federal government is the major funder of basic biomedical research. The NIH received $28.5 billion for 2007 to fund medical research. While states and private industry have taken up some funding of embryonic stem cell research, and they should be commended for doing so, this does not mean they can fill the gap left by the current administration’s policy. James Thompson, a stem cell pioneer, has pointed out that “the reality is that the federal government, the National Institutes of Health, is the funding that drives basic research and research into new therapies in this country. And if you exclude that, then you’re basically stuck.”

For this reason, the issue of stem cells has been bubbling beneath the surface of health discussion in the Senate and the House since 2001, despite President Bush’s staunch refusal to reconsider his decision. The most recent passage of H.R. 810 by the Senate represents a break within the Republican Party, as leaders including Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, have come forward in support of embryonic stem cell research. H.R. 810 is a crucial bill, because it would expand the number of embryonic stem cell lines available for federal funding. It would allow funding for research on lines derived from the over 400,000 embryos that are cryogenically frozen and stored in fertility clinics across the country. The vast majority of these embryos will never be implanted in a woman’s womb, but will remain indefinitely frozen or simply tossed down a sink. If these embryos are going to be destroyed anyway, should they not be used, with the consent of the donors, for research that could save countless patients whose personhood nobody questions?

Despite pleas by conservatives like Nancy Reagan and “591 different disease-related groups, patient-advocacy groups, universities, research institutions, renowned scientists, Nobel Prize winners,” according to Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), to support the bill, Bush has adamantly refused to change his stance.

Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) said before President Bush’s veto that “regardless of the president’s actions, whether he vetoes this bill or not, we intend to keep pushing this research forward.” Pushing this research forward to override a presidential veto will require 50 more House votes and four more Senate votes. As constituents it is our responsibility to apply the necessary pressure on our representatives to encourage them to vote for embryonic stem cell research. We cannot continue to allow Bush to impose a position that flies in the face of science and common sense. To do so would be to deny hope to the millions of patients who are anxiously waiting for the potential of embryonic stem cells to be realized.

Alix Rogers is a senior at the University of Pennsylvania and a bioethics intern at the Center for American Progress.

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