Human Cloning's Curtain Call

by Bruce R. Williams, D.O.

As a physician, I was heartened by last month's news that scientists had successfully created the equivalent of embryonic stem cells without human cloning experimentation. This new scientific breakthrough holds real promise for finding new cures and treatments. It should put an end to the human cloning debate that has been central to Missouri politics for years.

The new method, referred to as “direct reprogramming” allows researchers to use skin cells to reproduce stem cells identical to those that were previously taken from human embryos. No cloning. No destruction of human life. No ethical controversy.

How big is this breakthrough? The scientist who created Dolly the cloned sheep, Professor Ian Wilmut, has already announced he is abandoning cloning research in favor of the new method. Professor Wilmut believes this new method holds more promise for find treatments, including treating strokes, heart attacks, Parkinson’s and other diseases.

The fact that a human cloning pioneer like Professor Wilmut would shun human cloning experiments in favor of new and more promising research is rocking the scientific community. Many, including Professor Wilmut himself, are declaring this new process as the future for stem cell research. Medical and scientific experts are already predicting the end to human cloning experimentation.

As the journal Science reported last week, with the new procedure, “we would not need human embryos or (eggs) to generate patient-specific stem cells – and therefore could bypass the ethical and political debates that have surrounded the field.”

With this new breakthrough that makes human cloning irrelevant, private research money to support human cloning experiments will be almost impossible to find. Fortunately for the cloning proponents in Missouri, they have access to our tax dollars to fund their research. Now, more than ever, they are going to turn to us to fund their multi-million dollar human cloning agenda.

That is why the Missouri Cures Without Cloning initiative seeks to prohibit taxpayer funding of human cloning, as well as the unnecessary research. It would ensure that human cloning is prohibited within the state of Missouri, and no taxpayer funding could be used to fund such research anywhere.

Why should we, the taxpayers, foot the bill for research that is so obviously fruitless?

While this new scientific breakthrough holds the promise to new treatments for diseases including diabetes and Parkinson’s, why do some continue their battle to support human cloning? The time has come to say no to human cloning in Missouri and to ensure our hard earned tax dollars are not used for human cloning experimentation.

Dr. Williams is a family physician in Blue Springs, Missouri.

Our Press Release on the 'Christmas Breakthrough'

We sent out this press release this morning:

A Christmas Breakthrough:
Third Research Team Shows Human Cloning Is Not Necessary

ST. LOUS, MO – A new report published this week in the journal Nature shows that a third team of researchers has been able to “reprogram” ordinary skin cells to take on the properties of embryonic stem cells.

These new scientific breakthroughs hold real promise for savings lives without cloning human beings. In addition, Dr. Ian Wilmut – the scientist who cloned Dolly the Sheep – has even cited the new techniques has his reason for abandoning human cloning experimentation.

“The evidence continues to mount that human cloning is not necessary in the pursuit of lifesaving cures and treatments,” said Curt Mercadante, spokesperson for the Cures Without Cloning initiative to prohibit human cloning in Missouri. “And it underscores the need to pass a common sense prohibition on this dangerous, unproven and unnecessary practice.”

Reuters reports on the latest breakthrough:

Researchers get embryonic stem cells from skin (Maggie Fox, Reuters, 12/24/07)

A third team of researchers has found a way to convert an ordinary skin cell into valued embryonic-like stem cells, with the potential to grow batches of cells that can be directed to form any kind of tissue.

Their study, published on Sunday in the journal Nature, shows the approach is not a rare fluke but in fact something that might make its way into everyday use.

Scientists hope they are starting an age of regenerative medicine, in which people can get tailor-made treatments for injuries, diseases such as Parkinson's and diabetes, and in which scientists can study disease far better than before.

Dr. George Daley of Harvard Medical School and Children's Hospital Boston and colleagues got their skin cells from a volunteer, whereas the other two teams of researchers who have accomplished the feat got theirs from commercially available cells grown in labs - a seemingly small difference, but one Daley says shows it is feasible to get cells from any volunteer.

"Ours is the only group to go from skin biopsy to cell line," Daley said in a statement.

Cures without Cloning (CWC) is leading a broad-based, statewide coalition of grassroots organizations committed to prohibiting the cloning of human beings in Missouri. Interested citizens are invited to visit www.MOcureswithoutcloning.com for more information.

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Third research team experiences stem cell breakthrough

Reuters reports today that a third team of researchers has "found a way to convert an ordinary skin cell into valued embryonic-like stem cells, with the potential to grow batches of cells that can be directed to form any kind of tissue" ...

Their study, published on Sunday in the journal Nature, shows the approach is not a rare fluke but in fact something that might make its way into everyday use.

Scientists hope they are starting an age of regenerative medicine, in which people can get tailor-made treatments for injuries, diseases such as Parkinson's and diabetes, and in which scientists can study disease far better than before.

Dr. George Daley of Harvard Medical School and Children's Hospital Boston and colleagues got their skin cells from a volunteer, whereas the other two teams of researchers who have accomplished the feat got theirs from commercially available cells grown in labs -- a seemingly small difference, but one Daley says shows it is feasible to get cells from any volunteer.

"Ours is the only group to go from skin biopsy to cell line," Daley said in a statement.

They said they are now working to generate the so-called induced pluripotent stem cell or iPS cells to match a variety of diseases.

Wesley Smith Responds to Today's Post-Dispatch Letter

Wesley Smith (at the Secondhand Smoke blog) takes issue with a letter to the editor by a Missouri Coalition for Lifesaving Cures representative that was published in today's St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

Basically, the letter makes the false claim that proponents of a prohibition on human cloning would have somehow prevented the recent "direct reprogramming" breakthrough from becoming reality.

Smith retorts:

What hogwash. First, legislation in Missouri was always aimed at outlawing human cloning, not embryonic stem cell research. Indeed, ESCR would have remained perfectly legal in MO if A. 2 had failed. Second, the potential repeal pending in MO would really outlaw human cloning, and not impede ESCR in the least. Third, cloning had zero to do with the iPSC breakthrough, and indeed the new approach is seen widely as a moral and ethical way to derive pluripotent stem cells without SCNT cloning. Fourth, Bush-approved ES cell lines were and are perfectly suitable for the kind of basic research into pluripotency that scientists say they need to continue to perfect iPSCs. Finally, James Thomson, one of the scientists who demonstrated the viability of the approach, did so with an NIH grant from the dreaded Bush Administration.

Legal Update

As you know, we are currently involved in a legal challenge regarding the very inaccurate and misleading ballot summary proposed by the Secretary of State.

During a hearing earlier today, we had hoped to obtain a court date so that we could move this process along as quickly as possible.

Our goal is to have the courts rule in our favor soon - so that we dispatch our grassroots teams of volunteers across the state with a clear, accurate ballot summary to gather petition signatures.

Unfortunately, due to unforseen circumstances (a judge's illness) we will have to come back in early January, at which point our court date will be set.

Stay tuned! In the meantime...please keep visiting the blog, sending those letters to the editor to your local newspapers, and recruiting volunteers to help with our efforts to prohibit human cloning in Missouri!

A potential new treatment ... without human cloning?

This morning's Chicago Tribune has this story about a new potential breakthrough in which doctors in Japan have used stem cells - derived from liposunctioned fat - to help reconstruct the breasts of women who have had lumpectomies for breast cancer:

Doctors in Japan used stem cells derived from liposuctioned fat to repair the craters left in 21 women's breasts when cancerous lumps were cut out. The lead investigator, Dr. Keizo Sugimachi, reported Saturday at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium that the procedure was safe and well-tolerated in all 21 subjects, with no signs of rejection. There was a significant improvement in breast volume, and eight months later most of the women were satisfied with the outcome. Doctors not involved in the study were cautiously optimistic.

Additional clinical trials are necessary for this potential treatment, but it shows yet another example of promising research that is being conducted for life-saving and life-improving cures ... without cloning human beings.

KWMU story on "stem cell debate"

KWMU carries this story today on the initiative - and the new scientific breakthrough.

Jaci Winship of Missourians Against Human Cloning is quoted about the new breakthrough:

"It's obsolete technology, it's obsolete science from a number of scientists," says Jaci Winship with Missourians Against Human Cloning.

The story continues:

"Somatic cell nuclear transfer is the process for cloning, and if you somatic cell nuclear transfer with a human, which has not viably been done, then that's human cloning," said Winship. "And human cloning in any avenue for any purpose is wrong," she adds.

Winship and her group are trying to fill that loophole by putting another question on the November 2008 ballot. And they're using this latest development to prove that SCNT is no longer necessary.