FROM:
 Coalition for the Advancement of Medical Research website
www.camradvocacy.org

"Patient Groups Reject Kass Commission Call for Moratorium on Therapeutic
Cloning:
Moratorium Equals Ban on Life-Saving Medical Research
2,000 Scientists Join Criticism of Moratorium

Washington, DC--July 11, 2002--The Coalition for the Advancement of
Medical Research (CAMR) reacted today to the recommendation of the
President's Council on Bioethics for a "moratorium" on therapeutic
cloning (also known as somatic cell nuclear transfer, or SCNT). CAMR,
which opposes a ban on therapeutic cloning, has been leading the charge
to urge Senators to support this area of life-saving medical research.
"The Council's recommendation is a blow to the millions of Americans
fighting life-threatening medical conditions, because a moratorium has
the same effect as a ban on life-saving research," said Michael
Manganiello, President of CAMR. "Unfortunately, the Council has chosen to
join the opponents of therapeutic cloning who are calling for a
moratorium. A moratorium stigmatizes vital research and is extremely hard
to lift. Most importantly, it puts on hold medical breakthroughs that
seriously ill people must have access to."

"When the President's Council on Bioethics decided to exclude from their
committee those most affected by medical research-patients and their
families-they laid the groundwork for this terrible decision," said
Richard Arvedon, the father of a five-year-old daughter with Type 1
diabetes. "If the Council had included even one single advocacy group
representing people with diabetes, spinal cord injury, Parkinson's,
Alzheimer's, or other incurable diseases, they might have realized that a
moratorium has the same impact as a ban."

On Friday, July 12th Dr. Maxine Singer, former chief of the National
Cancer Institute's Laboratory of Biochemistry and current President of
the Carnegie Institution, will present the Council on Bioethics with a
petition against a moratorium and a ban on SCNT. The petition is signed
by 2,000 teachers and scientists in medical schools and university
science departments across the country. Signers come from all 50 states
and include 7 Nobel laureates.

"My mother was afflicted with Alzheimer's disease for about five years
before she died," said Raymond Barglow, a CAMR volunteer and one of the
lead organizers of the petition. "It was difficult to witness my mother's
gradual loss of memory and thought capacity, until she could no longer
recognize even members of her own immediate family. We were baffled by a
disease that modern medicine can, at this time, do very little to remedy.
I'd like to change that."

Barglow and a group of university student volunteers consulted with
physicians, medical school educators and scientists to organize a
petition campaign in support of therapeutic cloning research. Their
grassroots effort collected the 2,000 signatures, and they continue to
receive new signatures every day.

(The full text of the petition and a complete listing of signers
organizational affiliations are provided for identification purposes
only) can be found at
http://www.multiversity.org/sigpage-new-petition.htm.

Many of the signers also included public comments, including:

"I speak from the standpoint of an academic neurologist involved in
clinical research and the care of patients with neurodegenerative
disorders such as Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease and various
others that affect millions of people in the U.S. and around the world.
There is no cure for these devastating conditions that are characterized
by slow loss of brain cells and an undignifying death. Therapeutic
cloning is an option that may change the lives of these patients and
restore brain function. It is distinct from cloning humans for
reproductive purposes and researchers in this field need to be given the
freedom to explore the area. I support this entirely. The future of
scientific research should not be compromised by the misconceptions of a
few."

Kersi Bharucha M.D., Assistant Professor, Department of Neurology,
University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center, Oklahoma City, OK

"I am a scientist who does no cloning research, a practicing Christian,
and a parent of a child who died with a serious genetic disease with no
cure. I also serve as Chair of the University of Minnesota Institutional
Biosafety Committee which reviews recombinant DNA research and work with
biotoxins and pathogenic organisms. This has given me a front row seat to
see both the commitment of researchers to find cures for the horrible
diseases among us and a chance to see the value of safely regulating,
rather than stopping, new research techniques we have some concerns
about. Please fight to allow research with stem cells so that these
researchers can continue to make the progress that we all hope and pray
for in the battle against these diseases."

Louise Hawley, Ph.D, Assistant Professor, Department of Medical
Microbiology and Immunology, University of Minnesota School of Medicine
and Chair of University of Minnesota Institutional Biosafety Committee,
Duluth, MN.

"Without therapeutic cloning, future research using human embryonic stem
cells would be significantly hampered -- To ban therapeutic cloning would
not serve the interests of the U.S. taxpayers, nor would it stop the
research. It would merely encourage the best of our scientists in the
field to either stop doing it here in the U.S. or to do it in countries
supporting this research. The self-imposed embargo of the most promising
lines of research does not reflect the best judgment of this great
country, it only represents the ideology and religious belief of the
misinformed and the predetermined."

Jian Feng, Ph.D., Assistant Professor in the Department of Physiology and
Biophysics, SUNY-Buffalo, Buffalo NY

The Coalition for the Advancement of Medical Research (CAMR), is
comprised of nationally-recognized patient organizations, universities,
scientific societies, foundations, and individuals with life-threatening
illnesses and disorders, advocating for the advancement of breakthrough
research and technologies in regenerative medicine - including stem cell
research and somatic cell nuclear transfer - in order to cure disease and
alleviate suffering.
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Contact: Julie Kimbrough, 646-734-6091, [log in to unmask]
Coalition for the Advancement of Medical Research
2120 L Street, Suite 850
Washington, DC 20037

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