Posted at 11:10 p.m. EDT Sunday, July 22, 2001
Many states have already spoken on stem cell research
By SHERYL GAY STOLBERG  - New York Times News Service

WASHINGTON -- As President Bush and Congress struggle
with the question of regulating embryonic stem cell research,
one fact is being overlooked: Nearly two dozen states already
have laws that govern research on embryos and fetuses,
and at least nine ban any experimenting with human embryos.

Some of the laws date back decades, having been enacted
in response to Roe v. Wade, the 1973 Supreme Court decision
legalizing abortion. Just one state, South Dakota,
explicitly forbids stem cell studies; last year, at the urging
of abortion opponents, South Dakota made it a misdemeanor
to experiment with cells or tissues obtained from
human embryos.

Nonetheless, legal experts say the existing statutes
could impede university scientists and biotechnology
companies, not only because of the bans but also because
some states prohibit payment for embryonic tissue.
Broadly construed, these experts say, such a provision
could prevent scientists from buying the cells -- even if Bush
approves federal financing for research with them -- and
prevent companies from selling stem cell-based therapies.

"There are some hidden land mines working in this area,"
said Lori B. Andrews, a professor at Chicago-Kent College
of Law who has analyzed state restrictions on embryo research
for the National Bioethics Advisory Commission. Andrews
added, "I think the states will become a fertile battleground
for the larger social question of should embryo research
be permissible."

As past controversies surrounding abortion, fetal tissue
experiments and cloning suggest, state lawmakers often
step into the ethical debates posed by medicine and science.
So no matter what Bush and Congress decide, the thorny
questions about embryonic stem cell research may ultimately
be settled piecemeal, in the states. And state laws, in turn,
may lead to challenges in courts.

"If you look at the history of abortion, it seesaws between
federal and state legislation and federal and state courts,"
said R. Alto Charo, a professor of bioethics at the University
of Wisconsin. "It would not surprise me to find that Utah
decides to ban all research uses of embryos and that California
does not. In the end, we may end up with different rules
in different places."

Already, legislators in Charo's home state are debating
a ban on future studies involving stem cells derived from
human embryos. And Wisconsin is the birthplace
of embryonic stem cell science. In 1998 a University of
Wisconsin researcher, Dr. James A. Thomson, became the first
to isolate the cells, which hold promise for treating disease.

"I can't stop what happens elsewhere," said the measure's
author, state Rep. Sheryl K. Albers, a Republican. "If nothing
is changed on the national level, something does need
to change in Wisconsin."

Since Thomson's discovery, embryonic stem cells have generated
great excitement in science, and great angst in Washington.
These primordial cells, which may grow into any cell or tissue
in the body, are extracted from the inner mass of an embryo
when that embryo is just a tiny cluster of 100 to 300 cells,
small enough to fit on the tip of a sewing needle. Scientists
regard embryonic stem cells as the building blocks
of a new era of regenerative medicine, in which the body
will someday be used to heal itself.

But the research draws intense criticism from religious
conservatives and abortion opponents because the embryos,
which they regard as nascent human life, are destroyed.
Currently, embryonic stem cell experiments must be conducted
entirely with private money, because Congress has imposed
a ban on federal financing for the studies.

The issue before Bush is whether to make an exception
to that ban so that taxpayer money could be used to study
cells derived from embryos that have been kept frozen
at fertility clinics; scientists would not, however, be permitted
to work directly on embryos.

Congress may also weigh in. Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa.,
who is a strong supporter of the research, has introduced
legislation to allow government-financed scientists to derive
stem cells from embryos.

But the discussion in Washington centers on federal financing,
so it will have no effect on the private sector, where much
of the nation's stem cell research will undoubtedly occur.
Just this month, scientists at a private Virginia fertility clinic
announced that they had created embryos expressly to extract
stem cells. And a Massachusetts biotechnology company,
Advanced Cell Technology, is trying to use cloning technology
to make embryos -- 100- to 300-cell copies of existing
people -- that would yield stem cells with an exact tissue
match for patients.

The Food and Drug Administration has little jurisdiction
over such experiments; it typically oversees research only
when a therapy is being tested in people. So the matter
is left to the states. Virginia does not have laws governing
embryo research. A Massachusetts law, enacted in 1974,
prohibits use of "any live human fetus" in a scientific
experiment.

"We have looked at it about 40 times," said Mike West,
the chief executive of Advanced Cell Technology.
"We believe the law applies to fetuses," not embryos.

But Andrews, of Chicago-Kent College of Law, says that
over the years, the Massachusetts law has often been
interpreted to define an embryo as a fetus, and it has had
a "chilling effect" on scientists. When in vitro fertilization
was first being performed in Massachusetts, she said,
fertility specialists found themselves seeking opinions
from district attorneys on the legality of their work.

"I think some of these laws will be challenged in the wake
of desires to do embryo research," she said. "It is an issue,
because we have not yet come to a societal consensus
on the moral or legal status of the embryo."

SOURCE: The Charlotte Observer
http://www.charlotte.com/topnews/pub/stemcell.htm

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