STEM CELL RESEARCH BREAKTHROUGH

• First, a summary of the new method for retrieving stem cells.  Two separate teams of scientists, one led by Shinya Yamanaka of Kyoto University and the Gladstone Institute of Cardiovascular Disease in San Francisco and the other by James S. Thomson of the University of Wisconsin, turned human skin cells into embryonic stem cells without having to destroy a human embryo.  To do so, the scientists added four genes, which reprogrammed the chromosomes of the skin cells, making the cells into blank slates that should be able to turn into any of the 220 cell types of the human body.  Such a method will obviously reshape the stem cell field and the entire ethical debate surrounding it.  The new method also sidesteps other ethical quandaries, creating stem cells that genetically match the donor without needing to resort to cloning or the requisite donation of women’s eggs.  About four years ago, Dr. Yamanaka and Dr. Thomson independently hit upon the same idea.  They would search for genes that are being used in an embryonic stem cell that are not being used in an adult cell.  Then they would see if those genes would reprogram an adult cell.  Gautam Naik of the Wall Street Journal puts it this way:  “In both cases, the scientists inserted several genes into mature human cells.  For reasons that no one can yet fully explain, this reset the molecular clock and turned older, mature cells into embryonic-like cells.  Even among researchers, the result has a touch of science fiction.”  Rick Weiss of the Washington Post summarizes the potential for this research milestone:  “The unencumbered ability to turn adult cells into embryonic ones capable of morphing into virtually every kind of cell or tissue . . . has been the ultimate goal of researchers for years.  In theory, it would allow people to grow personalized parts for their bodies from a few of their own skin cells, while giving researchers a uniquely powerful means of understanding and treating diseases.” 

• Second, consider the ethical implications of this important discovery.  Dr. Thomson, one of the researchers of this new method, has had ethical concerns about embryonic research from the outset.  He has stated that “If human embryonic stem cell research does not make you at least a little bit uncomfortable, you have not thought about it enough.  I thought long and hard about whether I would do it.”  This was one of the factors that drove him to work on this new technique.  He believes that with this new technique it will not be long before the “stem cell wars are a distant memory. . . A decade from now, this will just be a funny historical footnote.”  That these patient-specific pluripotent stem cells can be generated easily and efficiently through direct reprogramming, without the use of human eggs or the generation of human embryos, is a tremendous leap forward.  As Maureen Condic and Markus Grompe, both senior fellows at the Westchester Institute of Ethics and the Human Person, argue, “Science has provided a resolution to the ethical and political debate. . . Scientists have access to an ethically uncompromised source of pluripotent stem cells for research, patients may ultimately benefit from therapies using these cells, and all citizens are spared the corrosive effects of ongoing cultural warfare over embryonic-destructive research.”  This new technique is also a vindication for President Bush.  In 2001, he slowed the rush toward public funding of research using the destruction of human embryos.  Instead, he directed millions of dollars toward alternative methods of obtaining stem cells, trusting that science would develop an alternative method, which it has now done.  This technique preserves the dignity of the human person and destroys the raw utilitarianism of the technological imperative—just because we can do a procedure does not stipulate that we must!  It also challenges the argument that a noble end stipulates any means to get to that end.  As Michael Gerson strongly suggests:  “Now, science has demonstrated an even greater power—the power of morally responsible technology to serve the cause of human dignity instead of undermining it.”  This is a model of ethically reasonable research in a morally diverse culture.  In His common grace, God is merciful in permitting science to discover this technique that preserves the dignity of humans.  May He receive the praise and the glory for this development.

• Finally, a thought about the worldviews behind stem cell research.  John Tierney, in a recent article in the New York Times, demonstrates the difference that worldview makes in how one does research in any scientific field.  Consider the matter of stem cell research.  In the West, scientists normally face a culture where a belief in God is foundational and somewhat determinative in funding such research.  The Judeo-Christian basis for Western Civilization has a problem with unhampered research using human embryos as a source for stem cells, because in doing so the embryo is killed.  But Asia offers researchers new labs, fewer restrictions and a different worldview about the value of the human being.  For example, Dr. Hwang Woo Suk, who reported on creating human embryonic stem cells through cloning, justified his techniques by citing his Buddhist belief in recycling life through reincarnation.  Cynthia Fox, the author of Cell of Cells, writes that “Therapeutic cloning in particular jibes well with the Buddhist and Hindu ideas of reincarnation.”  Most of southern and eastern Asia displays relatively little opposition to either cloned embryonic stem-cell research or genetically modified crops.  China, India, Singapore and other countries have enacted laws supporting embryo cloning for medical research, i.e., for therapeutic cloning.  But in North America and even in parts of Europe, embryo cloning is often banned or severally restricted in terms of funding.  It is outright banned in nations like Canada, Brazil and Mexico.  Why?  Christianity plays a role in the discomfort and reluctance to give blanket approval of such a technique.  In other words, stem cell research that kills a human embryo impacts human dignity—in the West still an important value; but in the East, a belief in reincarnation reduces or eliminates that concern for human dignity and respect.  Worldviews do make a difference!!

See John Tierney in the New York Times (20 November 2007); Michael Gerson in the Washington Post (23 November 2007); Maureen Condic and Markus Grompe in the Wall Street Journal (23 November 2007); Gina Kolata, “Researcher Who Helped Start Stem Cell War May Now End it,” New York Times (22 November 2007); Rick Weiss in the Washington Post (20 November 2007); Gina Kolata’s report on the new technique in the New York Times (21 November 2007); and Gautam Naik, Wall Street Journal (21 November 2007).