  human cloning why it is unethical
From:  David (DavidABrown)    3/23/2002 5:06 pm  
To:  ALL    
 
  343.1  
 
Source:   National Review; January 28, 2002

BioSpin:  Why adult-stem-cell-research successes get downplayed by the
media.
By Wesley J. Smith,

[Wesley J. Smith is the author of Culture of Death: The Assault no Medical
Ethics in America and a leading pro-life commentator on human cloning and
embryonic stem cell research.]

"Adult-Stem-Cell Breakthrough!" the headlines should have screamed.
"Stunning Discovery Could Mean No Need to Use Embryos in Research."
Unfortunately, with the notable exception of a front-page story in the
Boston Globe, the mainstream media has significantly downplayed this
potentially exciting scientific discovery.

Here's the scoop: As originally reported late last year in the medical
journal Blood, Dr. Catherine M. Verfaillie and other researchers at the
Stem Cell Institute, University of Minnesota, have discovered a way to
coax an adult cell found in the bone marrow to exhibit many of the
attributes that supposedly make embryonic stem cells irreplaceable to the
development future "miracle" medical therapies. While there is still much
research to be done, "multi-potent adult progenitor cells" (MAPCs) appear
to be versatile, that is, capable of transforming into different types of
tissues. (In a culture dish, the cells can be coaxed into becoming muscle,
cartilage, bone, liver, or different types of neurons in the brain.) They
are also malleable, meaning they can do so relatively easily. They also
exhibit the "immortality" valued in embryonic cells, that is to say, they
seem capable of being transformed into cell lines that can be maintained
indefinitely. At the same time, these adult cells do not appear to present
the acute danger associated with embryonic stem cells: the tendency to
grow uncontrollably causing tumors or even cancers.

This should be a big story considering the intense controversy over
embryonic-stem-cell research (ESCR) and the coming attempt in the United
States Senate to outlaw human cloning (S.790). Indeed, the New York Times
and Washington Post consider embryonic-stem-cell research so important --
including the manufacture and use of human-clone embryos in such
experiments -- that both have repeatedly editorialized in favor of turning
the throttle full-speed ahead on this immoral endeavor. Yet, when the
potentially crucial discovery of an adult cell that could make embryonic
destruction and therapeutic cloning unnecessary comes to light -- and just
at the time when the United States Senate is about to argue whether to
outlaw the cloning of human embryos -- other than the splendid Boston
Globe article, the story has been significantly underplayed.

The New York Times story written by Nicholas Wade with Sheryl Gay Stolberg
ran deep inside the paper (page A14), under the headline, "Scientists
Herald a Versatile Adult Cell." While the Times headline and reporting
focused upon the actual story, it failed to provide many of the
significant details found in the Boston Globe reporting, and as a result,
the story lost much of its punch.

The Washington Post smothered the importance of the story altogether in a
story bylined by Rick Weiss that ran on page A-8. Headlined, "In Senate,
Findings Intensify Arguments on Human Cloning," the actual discovery
itself is barely described. The first mention of it comes in the fourth
paragraph, which focuses primarily on a statement by Verfaillie
downplaying her own discovery so as not to interfere with the pro-cloning
and ESCR research agenda. Indeed, the primary thrust of the Post reportage
focuses on the reasons why this discovery should not deter destructive
embryonic research.

The story was also covered by relative brief wire-service reports and in a
much better story in New Scientist magazine. In any event, with such
muffled coverage, it is unlikely that news of the breakthrough will
receive the concentrated television coverage essential to a story reaching
critical mass. As a consequence, most Americans will probably never hear
about it or understand its potential importance.

This isn't the first time that major breakthroughs in adult-stem-cell
research have received under-whelming coverage. Indeed, a discernable
pattern has developed in the mainstream press regarding these issues.
Scientific breakthroughs involving embryonic cells generally receive the
full-brass-band treatment, with front-page coverage that often leaps to
the all-important television news. Meanwhile, you can usually hear the
crickets chirping when scientists announce a breakthrough in
adult-stem-cell research, or, as in the Post story, the reportage places
more emphasis on why the breakthrough should not deter destructive
embryonic research than on the actual adult-cell experiments.

There are many examples of this phenomenon. Here are just a few:

On July 19, 2001, the Harvard University Gazette reported that mice with
Type 1 diabetes (an autoimmune disorder) were completely cured of their
disease using adult stem cells. This was accomplished by destroying the
cells responsible for the diabetes, at which point, the animals' own adult
stem cells regenerated the missing cells with healthy tissue. Dr. Denise
Faustman told the Gazette, that if the therapy works out in humans "we
should be able to replace damaged organs and tissues by using adult stem
cells, thus eliminating, at least temporarily, the need to harvest and
transplant stem cells from embryos and fetuses." If this accomplishment --
a compete cure of a devastating disease -- had been obtained using
embryonic cells, the headlines would have matched those seen on V-J-Day.
But I know of no general media, either press or electronic, which reported
the story.

On June 15, 2001, the Globe and Mail (Canada) reported a wonderful story
that could provide great hope to people with spinal injuries. Israeli
doctors injected paraplegic Melissa Holley, age 18, who became disabled
when her spinal cord was severed in an auto accident. After researchers
injected her with her own white blood cells, she regained the ability to
move her toes and control her bladder. This is the exact kind of therapy
that embryonic-stem-cell boosters only hope they can begin to achieve in
ten years. Yet, is has been accomplished in the here and now, and other
than the Globe story, I know of no other reportage.

In December 2001, Tissue Engineering, a peer-reviewed journal, reported
that researchers believe they will be able to use stem cells found in fat
to rebuild bone. The researchers are about to enter extensive animal
studies. If these pan out, people with osteoporosis and other degenerative
bone conditions could benefit significantly. Yet, other than appearing on
an online health newswire, I have seen nothing about it from the
mainstream press.

All of this begs an intriguing question: Why is there so much less
interest in adult/alternative-stem-cell-research successes stories among
the media than they exhibit toward embryonic advances? After all, "the
science," were all that mattered, the visibility and coverage of stories
like those related above would at least equal the attention given to ESCR
stories. And therein lies the rub. I don't think that science is the
primary issue driving the extent and depth of news coverage. Media culture
is.

It is no secret that most members of the media are politically liberal and
adherents to a rational materialist worldview. They are also (generally)
emotionally pro-choice on abortion. Because the cloning/ESCR issues force
us to dwell on whether unborn human life has intrinsic value simply
because it is human, the issue tends to be viewed by journalists through a
distorting abortion prism.

This is very unfortunate. Abortion is factually irrelevant to this debate:
The legal reason abortion is permitted is to prevent women from being
forced to do with their bodies that which they do not wish to do, e.g.
gestate and give birth. But in cloning and ESCR, no woman is being forced
to do anything with her body. That is one reason why people on both sides
of the abortion divide oppose ESCR and human cloning. For example, Judy
Norsegian (author of the feminist tome Our Bodies Ourselves) and the
liberal public-policy advocate Jeremy Rifkin both oppose therapeutic and
reproductive cloning.

But that fact hasn't sunk in. And so the news sources the media uses to
present the case against cloning/ESCR are usually people they can damn (in
their eyes) with the label, "opponent of abortion." Thus, it appears that
the same dynamics that lead the New York Times and other media outlets to
refuse to use the term "partial birth abortion" when covering that issue,
are at play in editorial decisions about how to report upon this one.

I think another part of the explanation for the shallow coverage of
adult-stem-cell research is the media's obsession with "credentials." When
scientists say that embryonic stem cells offer far greater hope for future
medical therapies than do adult cells, journalists take one look at their
curricula vitae and believe them wholeheartedly. Never mind that these
biotech spokespersons may be as ideologically driven to their opinions in
favor of research as the "usual suspects" in the pro-life movement are to
theirs opposing it. And never mind that the incomes of some of these
scientists may depend on continued funding for ESCR and/or cloning. And
never mind that events have disproved their repeated assertions that
future cell therapies cannot be derived in any way other than through
embryonic sources. And never mind that President Clinton's National
Bioethics Advisory Commission, which first urged the government to fund
ESCR, stated that such experiments are "justifiable only if no less
morally problematic alternatives are available for advancing the research"
-- a state of affairs we have surely now reached. And forget that Big
Biotech has the same profit-driven agenda as other industries that are
viewed so skeptically by the media such as Big Tobacco and Big Oil. The
multiple university degrees and rational materialistic credentials make
what the biotech researchers say more "true" then whatever cloning/ESCR
opponents may argue -- regardless of the actual evidence.

Finally, clout in public-policy disputes usually boils down to money.
Quite often, reporters don't find stories; stories find reporters. That is
how PR firms make the big bucks; being paid quite handsomely to alert
journalists to stories their clients' want covered. In this fight, Big
Biotech's very deep pockets almost guarantee coverage that is skewed in
favor of destroying embryos in experiments and permitting the creation of
human-research clones. Or to paraphrase an old saying, he or she who has
the gold gets to spin the story.

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David A. Brown
Basic Christian: Forum
 
