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The Tampa Tribune Jul 10, 2001 Embryonic stem cell research takes the most ``pro-life'' position By Ellen Goodman BOSTON - I suppose that those of us who have been in this struggle awhile can be forgiven for taking a little pleasure at the civil war erupting among our opponents. Suddenly, politicians who call themselves ``pro-life'' are fighting over who deserves to wear that uniform. Orrin Hatch, an anti-abortion stalwart, is now saying defensively that ``people who are pro-life are also pro-life for existing life.'' Our point exactly. Isn't this why pro- choice folks resent the co-opting of the term ``pro-life''? But smugness won't do. We are witnessing what happens to every thoughtful person who wades into the moral terrain of reproductive technology. THIS TIME, THE FIRM line drawn by the pro-life forces - life begins at conception - begins to soften. The simple battle cry - a fertilized egg is a human being - begins to develop a counterpoint. The solid ground under the absolutists is beginning to shake. This civil strife is over embryonic stem cells. These cells, harvested from 5-day-old fertilized eggs, may offer the best hope - better than adult stem cells - for curing some pretty awful diseases from Alzheimer's to Parkinson's to juvenile diabetes. So the Bush administration must decide whether the government will fund research that uses stem cells from fertility clinic embryos. The argument over using the ``leftovers'' of couples who have given such permission has divided old anti-abortion allies. On the one hand, senators and former senators like Strom Thurmond and Connie Mack and Gordon Smith have come to agree with Hatch that stem cell research is ``the most pro-life position'' because of the possibility of saving lives. On the other hand, Republican House leaders like Dick Armey and Tom DeLay and J.C. Watts warned Bush: ``It's not pro-life to rely on an industry of death even if the intention is to find cures for diseases.'' The president, stalling for time, searching for an elusive compromise, has said he will decide ``in a while.'' But which will it be? Using the stem cells for potentially life-saving research? Or letting the embryos remain in some fertility clinic locker to be frozen or destroyed? To condemn stem cell research as an ``industry of death,'' you must begin by opposing in vitro fertilization. The Catholic Church, consistent if nothing else, opposes the creation as well as the destruction of a fertilized egg outside of the womb. But most Americans regard IVF as a blessing for many couples and see fertility clinics as places where life begins. So, as bioethicist Bonnie Steinbock of the University at Albany says, the political wrangling must leave these people scratching their heads. ``You mean,'' she says, imagining their conversations, ``creating surplus embryos is fine, discarding embryos is fine, keeping them in the freezer in perpetuity is fine, the only thing that is not fine is using them for medical research?'' Many who are normally pro-life, says Steinbock, cannot reconcile discarding or freezing eggs as more respectful of life than using them to find a cure. Those who may not identify with a desperately pregnant woman in search of an abortion find themselves siding with a desperately sick person in search of a cure. In some ways, the endless abortion argument has driven all other discussion over reproduction to the extremes. At one end, the fertilized egg is talked about as little more than tissue. On the other end, it is given the full moral stature of a human being. Those who favor abortion rights have been challenged and sometimes divided by the grim choices of late-term abortions. Until now though, as Thomas Murray of the Hastings Center says, ``The pro-life movement has been able to dodge a problem within their ranks for many years: the moral status of the very early embryo, prior to implantation, perhaps not even within a woman's body.'' Now, in this civil war over ``life,'' they face a parallel divide, ``Most people,'' says Murray, ``do not view either birth control as murder, or IVF then freezing as equivalent to placing your 5-year-old in the deep freeze.'' IF THERE IS ONE THING that comes out of this political skirmish, it's the understanding that an embryo created in a dish is not a thing and not a person. We cannot use embryos for frivolous purposes. ``We don't make earrings out of them, we don't use them in high school labs,'' says Steinbock. But we can, with seriousness and respect, use them for medical research that will, one hopes, save lives. Yes being ``pro-life'' also means being ``pro-life for existing life.'' Those who now call themselves pro-life and pro-stem cell research have had to give up the simple and simplistic idea that a fertilized egg is a full and equal human life. Welcome. There's plenty of room under the banner that reads: It's more complicated than that. Ellen Goodman is a Boston Globe columnist. Her e-mail address is [log in to unmask] http://www.tampatrib.com/News/MGA83DORYOC.html * * * ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask] In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn