Bogus Gold

Here's an interesting counter claim from Maureen L. Condic, an associate professor of neurobiology and anatomy at the University of Utah School of Medicine:

In light of the serious problems associated with embryonic stem cells,” I noted in 2002, “there is no compelling scientific argument for the public support of research on human embryos.” Serious scientific challenges are, by definition, problems that have stubbornly resisted the best attempts of science to resolve them. Over the past thirty years, hundreds of billions of dollars and countless hours of research by dedicated professionals worldwide have been devoted to solving the problems of immune rejection and tumor formation, yet these issues remain serious scientific and medical challenges. The mysteries of embryonic development have been plumbed for more than a hundred years by some of the most brilliant biologists of history, and yet, despite the clear progress we have made, we are nowhere near the point of having a “recipe book” for cooking up cellular repair kits to treat human disease and injury. Immune rejection, tumor formation, and embryonic development have proved themselves to be profoundly serious scientific challenges, and they are likely to remain so for decades into the future.

The hubris of scientists in the field of embryonic stem cell research who confidently asserted “Give us a few years of unrestricted funding and we will solve these serious scientific problems and deliver miraculous stem cell cures” was evident in 2002, and it is even more evident today. For the past five years, researchers have had completely unrestricted funding to conduct research on animal embryonic stem cells, and yet the serious scientific problems remain. They have had every conceivable tool of modern molecular research available to them for use in animal models, and yet the serious scientific problems remain. Millions of dollars have been consumed, and hundreds of scientific papers published, and yet the problems still remain. The promised miraculous cures have not materialized even for mice, much less for men.

In June 2004, Ron McKay at the National Institutes of Health acknowledged in a Washington Post interview that scientists have not been quick to correct exaggerated claims of the medical potential of embryonic stem cells, yet McKay justified this dishonesty by stating: “To start with, people need a fairy tale. Maybe that’s unfair, but they need a story line that’s relatively simple to understand.” Isn’t it time Americans recognize the promise of obtaining medical miracles from embryonic stem cells for the fairy tale it really is?

In summary, far from the "most promising" claim made by the Star Tribune, embryonic stem cell research is proving anything but. Indeed, embryonic research supporter Ron McKay, who is a bit more familiar with the actual scientific evidence than the Star Tribune editors, characterized belief in that promise as a "fairy tale."

The alleged "promise" held by embryonic versus adult stem cells can be summarized in one word: pluripotent. Pluripotent stem cells have the potential to develop into any cell type in the body. Embryonic stem cells are known to have this quality.

It's certainly not a lust for killing embryos that generates great scientific interest in embryonic stem cells, it is rather a desire for this pluripotency. However, while scientists continue to struggle with embryonic stem cells in current experimentation, there is other research being performed to discover ways to create pluripotency in adult stem cells.

Critics will rightly note that research into this potential has yet to produce usable results. To which the reply is: Yes, but you're using the euphemism "promising" when you encounter that same scenario in embryonic stem cell research. So for the sake of consistency shouldn't we use the same term here?

If adult stem cells can be made pluripotent you no longer need to solve the problems unique to embryonic stem cells - immune system rejection, somatic-cell nuclear transfer (i.e. cloning) - and along the way you might have solved the problems of teratoma and embryonal carcinoma formation currently prohibiting usable embryonic stem cell treatments. A tall order? Sure. But embryonic stem cell therapies have yet to show any greater potential for quick solutions. They simply have pluripotency - along with a handful of fundamental problems researchers haven't figured any way around yet.

Back to the Star Tribune:

[President Bush's] policy is radical because it draws an arbitrary and perverse moral line far from where most draw one, and because it assumes that controls couldn't be put in place to prohibit any "slippery slope" toward what it purports to fear: the production of embryos for harvesting.

Got that? It's "radical" because it's so far away from "most people." Yet the line is also called "perverse" based on ... I dunno. They just say it is. And also because we could draw another arbitrary (still perverse?) moral line to prevent a slippery slope into embryo harvesting.

First, since many people would draw the line at "no embryo 'harvesting' of any kind," a line merely prohibiting federal funding of most embryo "harvesting" doesn't seem very radical on its face. Second, I have never seen a poll where an especially large number - say 60% - of Americans would move this line far from where it is.

I think the more likely source of Bush's "radicalism" is that the Star Tribune likes calling conservatives "radical" or "extreme." So let's move past the name calling into the substance of the Strib's point.

What scientists want, and what Congress wants to allow, is something very different: public funding for the study of unneeded embryos bound for destruction, created by couples who wish to donate them to research. Such research gives added life to stem cells -- life in the lab that could lead to breakthroughs in regenerative medicine.

So I did a little looking around and hit upon this article in the New York Times, which included a description of the stem cell bill Congress just passed and to which the Strib editors refer.

It would merely allow scientists supported by the federal government to derive new cultures of stem cells from the early embryos discarded by clinics using in-vitro fertilization.

That's the good side. The bill is a fairly modest moving of the previously mentioned "arbitrary line" to another arbitrary spot (I don't know if this new spot is still "perverse" because we never quite established how they derived that above, but we'll leave that aside).

However the same article goes on to note a bit of a disconnect between the over-promising rhetoric and the scientific reality behind this bill.

Even scientists who believe that the restrictions on embryonic stem cell research have been harmful are concerned about the overstatements.

“We don’t know yet how valuable this technology is going to be,” said Thomas Cech, president of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. “All of a sudden, the content increases in value just because you can’t have it,” Dr. Cech said.

Oh, and this article talks about stem cell "promise" too.

Many biologists believe that the most promising immediate use of embryonic stem cells is in the study of disease-specific cells, an idea long advocated by Dr. Irving Weissman of Stanford University. If scientists could generate embryonic cells from patients’ adult cells, they could study Parkinson’s or diabetes, for example, from its earliest moments, laying the groundwork for rebuilding a patient’s diseased tissues.

But this approach requires generating stem cell lines to order, from adult cells, and the House bill does not address this issue. It only permits the creation of more lines from surplus fertility clinic embryos, similar to those already available.

Funny. I was told by the Star Tribune that "the most promising" stem cell research was embryonic. What the heck could the Dr. Weissman's of the world be smoking? Don't they educate themselves by reading Star Tribune editorials?

Let's let the Star Tribune editors finish, and then I'll finish them off in turn.

The Bush policy is disingenuous because it pretends that the existence of other lines of cell research -- the study of amniotic stem cells, for example -- means we're not losing out if we fund those and leave embryo research to others. That is simply not the case; scientists agree that embryonic cells offer more promise for being able to regenerate damaged cells; thus hampering their study slows progress. Congress knows that, and eventually will prevail.

As has been already noted, we're hardly "leaving embryo research to others" (although remember when we all believed we had?). Scientists are already conducting unrestricted embryonic stem cell research on animals; and the extent of the human embryonic research enabled by the recent Congressional bill is hardly a major change. Additionally, the Star Tribune editorial completely ignores either the current problems confronting the development of embryonic stem cell therapy, or the potential of non-embryonic stem cell therapies. So who's really being disingenuous here?

The cozy conflation of the theoretical potential of embryonic stem cells with what the current legislation enables is misleading at best. Using a phrase like "scientists agree," is a lazy over-generalization at best.

But then, the Star Tribune editors aren't pedaling science. They're telling fairy tales.