July 26, 2006 

Senator John Kyl

730 Hart Senate Office Building 

Washington, DC 20510-0304

RE: ADULT STEM CELL TREATMENT LIES

Dear Senator Kyl:

Thank you for your response to my complaint about Bush's veto of HR 810.

Although I do not agree with you or the president that microscopic undifferentiated cells are people, I can understand your moral qualms and respect your view even though I think it is wrong. What I cannot abide are the misleading and downright false assertions about the promise of adult stem cell research.

I have read Brownback's list of 65 treatments and want you to be aware that anyone who has read them or suffers from a devastating disease or disability knows the truth and your using them as a substitute for the real promise of embryonic stem cell research is not going to fly.

The "treatments" ranged from animal studies and non-adult stem cell Amgen's aborted GDNF trials for Parkinson's, to cord blood and bone marrow transplants in conjunction with chemo which resulted in remissions in some patients because they were able to tolerate higher doses of chemo. Dangerous and risky side effects and difficulty in obtaining genetic matches were problems. Alleviation of diseases only occurred when tumors were diagnosed early. In most of the anecdotal, small study cases death or return of the disease was the victor. 

Such was the case with Dennis Turner who received his own brain cells to treat his Parkinson' disease. He enjoyed a 4-5 year reprieve from symptoms, but when I talked to him on 4-24-06 his PD had returned with a vengeance and his Dr. Levesque's Phase II experiment was stalled. People with Parkinson's, such as myself, were outraged when we saw Senator Brownback flashing Turner's picture on the Senate floor during the debate on HR 810.

Scientists Shane Smith of the Children's Neurobiological Solutions Foundation in Santa Barbara, CA, William P. Neaves of the Stowers Institute for Medical Research in Kansas City, MO and Steven Teitelbaum of Washington University in St. Louis, MO concur that the list of 72 ASCR treatments compiled by David Prentice, of the bible-based Family Research Council, "not only misrepresents existing adult stem cell treatments , but also frequently distorts the nature and contents of the references he cites." They conclude only nine treatments qualify as valid treatments for disease, but opponents of ESCR are still touting the superiority of ASCs over ESCRs.

There are no cures for ovarian cancer (of which I am a survivor), testicular cancer, breast cancer, brain tumors, cystic fibrosis, non-Hodgkins Lymphoma, Alzheimer's, MS, ALS, PSP, Parkinson's, spinal cord injuries and countless other diseases. It is going to take years to conquer these diseases and I do not expect a cure in my lifetime. But what sustains many of us is the hope that future generations will not suffer as we do. We need ALL kinds of stem cell research NOW. Unless the research is done, we will never know what works best for which disease.

Rayilyn Brown

18507 N. Windfall Dr.

Surprise AZ 85374

623-584-5869

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