The source of this article is the Winston-Salem Journal: 
http://tinyurl.com/6z52j

North Carolina U.S.Senate candidates differ slightly on stem-cell research
Studies necessary for developing scientific knowledge, standards, scientists 
say


By David Rice
JOURNAL RALEIGH BUREAU


As John Kerry and President Bush trade charges over use of human stem cells 
to generate potential cures for debilitating diseases, North Carolina's 
candidates for the U.S. Senate both say they support embryonic stem-cell 
research - but to differing degrees.

"I'm for stem-cell research," Democrat Erskine Bowles said. "I'll be a 
champion for it. I lost my dad and little sister to Lou Gehrig's disease. 
I've got two boys who have Type 1 diabetes."

Bush announced in August 2001 that he would allow private research on stem 
cells to continue, but he would limit federal spending for research on 
embryonic stem cells to existing cell lines. Scientists say that there are 
only about 20 such lines.

Republican Rep. Richard Burr, who normally aligns with Bush, says that 
although research on stem cells derived from adults is more promising, he 
would support the use of 300,000 frozen embryos in fertility clinics around 
the country for stem-cell research, provided that the donors give their 
consent.

"I actually differed from the president slightly, because I felt there was 
an expansion a little bit further than the president suggested," Burr said.

When Bush announced his decision in 2001, Burr wrote: "Many of those embryos 
are destroyed years later because they are no longer needed by the couples 
who created them. I cannot support the destruction of those embryos if the 
alternative is to use their stem cells for research that could save 
thousands, if not millions of lives."

The stem-cell issue is an emotional one that tests the definition of when 
life begins. It weighs the potential benefits to millions who suffer from 
juvenile diabetes, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and other debilitating diseases 
against what many see as the sanctity of a 5-day-old embryo.

Though research on stem cells harvested from adults is not controversial, 
some scientists are eager to explore embryonic stem cells - cells harvested 
from a 5- to 6-day-old embryo that they believe can develop into tissues 
that might be used to replace damaged heart, lung, nerve or pancreatic cells.

But the embryo must be destroyed to harvest those cells, leading to outcries 
from religious and anti-abortion groups who say that federal money should 
not pay for it.

Kerry has criticized Bush's stance, saying that it was driven by ideology, 
that existing cell lines can be contaminated, that U.S. researchers are 
losing their edge and that he would lift Bush's restrictions on federal 
money for stem-cell research. Kerry says he would increase federal spending 
on stem-cell research from $25 million to $100 million.

In North Carolina's Senate race, Bowles, a former president of the Juvenile 
Diabetes Foundation who went to work for President Clinton after Clinton 
lifted a ban on fetal-tissue research, is an unabashed supporter of 
stem-cell research.

"The scientists and the doctors at the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation tell me 
this is our best hope for a cure. I'm for it," Bowles said.

He contends that unused embryos at fertility clinics can be used for 
invaluable research.

"What makes me so mad - these are embryos or cells that are going to be 
discarded, thrown away," Bowles said. "I don't want to cross a moral line. I 
want to make sure we have the strongest ethical guidelines going. But to 
throw these away and destroy them when they could save people's lives?"

Though Burr's stance differs from that of Bush, he says that it is 
consistent with that of such anti-abortion members of Congress as Sen. Bill 
Frist, R-Tenn., the Senate majority leader, and Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, 
and former Gov. Jim Martin of North Carolina, who once headed medical 
research at Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte.

"The implications of this plan on the abortion debate are understood, but 
many of us are willing to take this step forward because the potential 
benefits of stem cell research are unlimited," Burr wrote in 2001.

Rather than leave the research strictly to the private sector, Burr says 
that the National Institutes of Health should manage federal dollars that 
support stem-cell research.

If NIH oversees federal money for stem-cell research, "Those gains will be 
made within a well-regulated and transparent structure that discourages the 
growth of a private, made-to-order embryo market," Burr wrote three years ago.

But Burr says today that research on adult stem-cell lines might be more 
important than embryonic cells.

"The science does not lead one to believe that our most promising course is 
embryonic stem cells. The science says it's adult stem cells. So I think 
we've actually got our money in the right place," Burr said.

"Quite honestly, embryonic stem cells lack any science to suggest this is an 
area of enlargement of federal participation," he said.

Researchers worry that the charged political debate over stem cells has 
polarized discussions in a murky research world where there are still many 
unknowns.

"This is research, after all," said Huntington Willard, the director of Duke 
University's Institute for Genome Sciences and Policy. "This is not clinical 
practice. By definition, research is uncertain and it takes time.

"Kerry, in particular, talks about cures that are just around the corner. I 
don't think that's realistic," Willard said.

He also criticizes Republicans for hyping their commitment to stem-cell 
research. He points to how Frist said at the Republican National Convention 
that the Bush administration has supported the research "at record levels."

"Well, anything more than zero dollars is going to be a 'record level' when 
five years ago most of this stuff didn't even exist," he said.

Robert Cook-Deegan, the director of Duke's Center for Genome Ethics, Law and 
Policy, agreed that Republicans and Democrats are both playing fast and 
loose with the facts.

"It's irrevocably partisan now," Cook-Deegan said. "What we're talking about 
here is the very thin line between false hope and false promise. I don't 
think it's false hope, but I think it's a false promise.

"The fact is that none of us on this Earth can tell you that because of this 
research, we're going to have a cure for diabetes in five years. That's just 
false," Cook-Deegan said.

"But somebody saying that you can do anything with adult stem cells that you 
can with embryonic stem cells - you can't say that either, because we don't 
know. They're hoping that it will do the same thing, but we don't know," he 
said.

Willard and Cook-Deegan said that it remains an open question whether adult 
stem cells are as malleable for creating new tissues as embryonic stem cells 
are believed to be.

But Willard said that researchers and federal authorities should push 
forward with research on adult stem cells as they await resolution of the 
political and moral questions surrounding embryonic cells.

"There is no scientific evidence in my view that is credible that says adult 
stem cells won't work and that embryonic stem cells are the only way to go," 
Willard said.

"You get answers by doing more research, and to me, that's pretty cut and 
dry," he said. "We need to get on with the research and see what happens."

• David Rice can be reached in Raleigh at (919) 833-9056 or at 
[log in to unmask]

• More information on the U.S. Senate race is available at www.journalnow.com

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