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For those of you who cannot access the Web, I'm printing in part , the testimony of Darwin J. Prockop M.D. Director, Center for Gene Therapy Tulane University Medical Center New Orleans, LA. Dr Prockop starts by telling all the wonderful things they have discovered with ADULT STEM CELLS. I didn't copy all of it, but if someone is interested and can't access the WEB, please email me OFF-LINE and I will provide the testimony he gave before the Senate Committee this morning. MJF's is not posted yet, unfortunately. The following is how Dr. Prockop finished his testimony: <SNIP> In closing I would like to make two general statements. One is, yes, it is true that if the work that my laboratory and many others are now doing continues to be successful, it will open the possibility of using stem cells from adults, or even from the patient himself or herself, to treat a large number of terrible diseases. If successful, the therapies will not use any fetal tissues and probably will not use any viruses. However, I would like to stress the second very important point: we are not there yet. We have a long way to go. In my estimation, it will be at least two years before the first adult stem cells can be tested in patients with diseases such as Parkinsonism. It will probably be much longer for testing the cells in patients with the other diseases I have mentioned. We simply cannot be certain in advance which therapies will work and which will not. We need several years of hard work and we need continuing support from sources such as the National Institutes of Health and other sources such as the Louisiana State Consortium for Gene Therapy and the Columbia Healthcare Association that are currently supporting the Tulane Center for Gene Therapy. In my opinion, it would be a serious mistake to stop all research on human embryonic cells and tissues because of the exciting discoveries my laboratory and others have recently made about adult stem cells. We are simply not ready for a moon shot-like strategy in which we place all our bets on adult stem cells. I think it would be a mistake to tell the millions and millions of people whose lives are being destroyed by these terrible diseases that they to wait three, four, five years or even longer until we see the results obtained with adult stem cells before we even begin doing research on the other kinds of tissues and cells that may cure their diseases. I myself would be extremely sorry to see this sub committee or any other group decide that because of the work we and others have done on marrow stem cells, the kinds of research called for in the new NIH guidelines should be stopped.