http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/2000-02/17/096l-021700-idx.html
Pro-Life And Pro-Hope
By Joan Samuelson
Thursday, February 17, 2000; Page A31
It is time for a fact check on rhetoric by Gov. George W. Bush's
campaign
and its allies attacking Sen. John McCain's support for fetal
tissue
research. I know what happened, because I lobbied Congress to lift
the
six-year ban on federal support for the research, which it did in
1993.
I care because I have Parkinson's disease. I fear that
inaccuracies spread
by Bush campaign spokesmen or supporters such as the National
Right to
Life Committee will misinform the public on the merits of this
research--and imperil one of my best hopes for a cure.
Listening to the sound bites--that McCain is a "liberal" and "soft
on
abortion"--one would assume the "fetal tissue issue" is, in fact,
an abortion
issue. It isn't, and it never has been, and many "pro-life"
legislators strongly
support the research.
Allowing research using fetal tissue does not affect whether or
not an
abortion will happen. A 1997 General Accounting Office study
confirmed
that longstanding guidelines prevent the decision to donate tissue
from
influencing the decision whether to have an abortion in the first
place. For
example, they prohibit tissue donors from deciding who will
receive a
tissue transplant and outlaw payment to women who decide to
donate.
What's more, the research has produced lifesaving results. Medical
science
has used tissue remaining from elective abortions for decades,
producing
such breakthroughs as the polio vaccine. In the case of
Parkinson's, the
ban delayed progress, but now the research is beginning to bear
fruit.
Scientists are confident an effective treatment using transplanted
cells will
emerge.
So the question the pro-life community has faced is: If remains
from a legal
abortion can save lives, should the tissue be made available to
scientists--or thrown away? When staunch pro-life senators like
Strom
Thurmond, Connie Mack and then-Majority Leader Bob Dole reviewed
these facts in March 1992, they voted for the research. Dole put
it most
memorably: Supporting the research was the "true pro-life
position." Every
time the issue has come up, Congress has supported the research by
large,
bipartisan majorities.
As for McCain, initially he was less supportive of the research
than
Thurmond and the others. In his first vote, he joined with some
other
pro-life senators who took a harder line, opposing any bill
containing the
research no matter what, on the theory that nothing positive
should follow
from an abortion.
Eventually, however, his votes began to join the pro-research
side. Why?
Because, he says, he simultaneously was watching his longtime
friend Rep.
Morris K. Udall waste away from Parkinson's in a hospital bed.
This
experience eventually drove McCain to accept the role of
Republican
sponsor of the nation's first Parkinson's research legislation.
With Sen. Paul
Wellstone--who watched both parents suffer and die of
Parkinson's--McCain led the Morris K. Udall Parkinson's Research
Act to
passage in 1997.
Nothing in this record suggests a pro-abortion leaning. The Udall
bill never
even mentions fetal tissue, which is only a small part of the
Parkinson's
research portfolio, but the Right to Life Committee attack links
the two and
concludes that McCain's support for the bill weakens his pro-life
credentials. That's a leap that can't be defended.
If McCain suffers politically because of this attack, the real
victims will be
millions of Americans like me--with Parkinson's, spinal cord
injuries,
blindness--who hope for a breakthrough in medical research.
The explosion of medical technology is offering new hope for
myriad
incurable disorders. In some cases, though, as with stem cell
research, new
ethical, religious and legal questions are raised, and Congress
will be in the
middle of the debate.
When that happens, Americans deserve the same thoughtful
deliberation
Congress gave the fetal tissue debate, sifting out simplistic,
sound-bite
conclusions and groundless accusations, until the core issues can
be
addressed.
The writer is president of the Parkinson's Action Network.
© Copyright 2000 The Washington Post Company
--
Charlotte A. Mancuso
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