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John C - What an interesting article, most especially because my husband
had to have a mitral valve transplant, and a pig's valve was used.  This
gave him another 7 years of life, for which we were both very grateful.
I certainly hope Bush's program (as much as I like him,. I would have to
disagree with him on this), doesn't affect that because many lives would
be lost.  I wish he had a neurologist on his staff.  Best to you.
Appreciate your articles.  Jo Ann

On Fri, 22 Apr 2005 22:53:03 -0500 John Cottingham
<[log in to unmask]> writes:
> The source of this article is the International Herald Tribune:
> http://tinyurl.com/dadbh
>
> Blending of species raises ethical issues
>
>    By Carolyn Y. Johnson The Boston Globe
>    Thursday, April 21, 2005
> Lines blurred between man and beast
>
> BOSTON In labs around the world, the line between man and beast is
> blurring. Herds of pigs are grown with partly human livers in the
> hopes of
> solving the organ-transplant shortage. Mice with human cells are
> used as
> the new "guinea pigs" for testing drugs or figuring out disease.
> Human
> brain cells are grown inside mouse skulls to help better understand
> diseases like Parkinson's and Alzheimer's.
> .
> Scientists are using such chimeras - animals whose bodies are a
> mosaic,
> with their own cells intermixed with those of another animal - to
> model
> diseases, test drugs on live human cells, and harvest organs for
> transplant.
> .
> But the blending of species also has raised a host of ethical and
> philosophical questions over the past year.
> .
> Last month, the George W. Bush's Council on Bioethics struggled to
> understand when a human-animal chimera is a useful tool, and when it
> becomes "high-tech bestiality." The United States turned down a
> seven-year-old patent application for a chimpanzee-human mix, the
> "humanzee," in February, with patent officers calling on Congress
> for
> guidance. Canada banned the creation of all chimeras last year. And
> the
> National Academy of Sciences is set to release ethical guidelines
> this
> month for researchers who use stem cells to create chimeras.
> .
> "The question is, where does it all end?" said Stuart Newman, a
> developmental biologist from New York Medical College who proposed
> the
> humanzee because he wanted to draw public attention to a morally
> questionable but technically feasible scientific project that might
> follow
> from some of today's experiments. "At some point, everyone will be
> offended."
> .
> Animal rights advocates argue that any manipulation of animals for
> human
> benefit, whether for dinner or for research, is immoral.
> .
> Christian teaching holds that the Bible gives people dominion over
> animals.
> .
> "That really means stewardship - you cannot abuse them for your
> good. But
> just as you would eat a pig or eat a cow, I see no problem in
> putting a pig
> valve in a human being or a pig kidney within a human being," said
> Dr.
> David Stevens, executive director of the Christian Medical
> Association, a
> U.S. group that advocates the practice of medicine from a religious
> perspective.
> .
> The problem arises, Stevens said, when scientists fundamentally
> alter what
> it means to be human or animal. "If you give an animal a human
> brain, if
> you give an animal human reproductive organs, if you make a human
> embryo
> that's not fully human, that crosses the ethical, moral, and
> biblical line."
> .
> The Roman Catholic Church has grave concerns that chimera research
> may
> create beings without a clear moral status. "I think it would be
> basically
> immoral to create a human whose status we could not determine. We'd
> have an
> unresolvable dilemma about how to treat this animal," said Richard
> Doerflinger, deputy director of the secretariat for pro-life
> activities at
> the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
> .
> The scientists doing work on chimeras see their work as ethical and
> responsible and believe it has tremendous potential benefit.
> .
> Charlotte Kuperwasser, a biologist at Tufts University, created a
> mouse
> with human breast tissue to solve a longstanding problem in
> research, that
> testing drugs by looking at cells in a dish or making a mouse
> version of
> the disease doesn't necessarily help actual patients.
> .
> Mouse cancers, she said, "'don't look like human tumors. They don't
> behave
> like the actual breast cancer. We can cure mouse breast cancers, but
> that
> can't always translate to the clinic."
> .
> By adding human breast cells to immune-deficient mice before
> puberty,
> Kuperwasser has been able to watch normal breast development and
> generate
> human cancers rather than mouse ones in her lab animals. Now, she is
> working to implant particular patients' cancer into mice to see if
> they can
> test drugs and cures on it without harming the person.
> .
> In Nebraska, William Beschorner is working to create a human immune
> system
> and humanized liver in a pig. Eventually the biologist hopes to
> replicate a
> particular patient's immune system and then transplant the pig's
> organs
> back into the person, where they would appear familiar to the immune
> system, and therefore wouldn't be rejected.
> .
> Even scientists pause, though, when experiments creep from basic
> organs to
> the seat of human consciousness - the brain - or when stem cells,
> controversial in their own right, are added to the mix.
> .
> Four years ago, Irving Weissman, a stem-cell biologist at Stanford,
> created
> a mouse with human neurons in its brain, hoping that the living
> model would
> provide insights into diseases like Parkinson's and Alzheimer's.
> .
> The human neurons made up about 1 percent of the mouse brain and
> were
> alive, but it was unclear whether they were functioning. He
> suggested
> another project: creating a mouse with 100 percent human nerve cells
> in its
> brain.
> .
> He asked an informal committee to review his proposal, and the group
> recently drew up guidelines for doing the experiment responsibly.
> .
> Hank Greely, head of that committee, described one clear limit. "If
> you see
> anything that is not unequivocally mouse behavior, you stop the
> experiment," he said.
> .
> Scientists agree that human brain cells growing in a mouse are
> unlikely to
> humanize a mouse because of the vast differences in skull size and
> brain
> architecture. But in a closely related animal, the threat of an
> animal
> floating somewhere between human and animal becomes more serious.
> .
> "What is essentially human is really debased," Alfonso Gomez-Lobo, a
> member
> of the Council on Bioethics, said in March. "I often imagine what it
> would
> be like to wake up one day only to realize that I have the body of a
> chimpanzee."
> .
> A chimera is an animal with its own cells and that of another animal
> growing side by side in its body. Scientists used to call such
> animals
> "tetraparental," meaning they had four parents - their own, and the
> parents
> of the other cells living in their bodies.
> .
> The "geep" is an example of a true chimera. Scientists at the
> University of
> California at Davis fused together sheep and goat embryos. In the
> offspring, every organ, including the sex organs, were made up of
> both goat
> and sheep cells, which meant that one geep could produce both goat
> and
> sheep sperm.
> .
> Many other kinds of chimeras are made by adding human cells to
> animals that
> have been genetically altered to have no immune system. Without the
> immune
> system, which would attack foreign cells, scientists can grow human
> brain
> cells or breast cells in another animal, often a mouse.
> .
> Chimeras surround us, and not just in the lab. Cardiac surgery
> patients who
> receive pig valves to repair their hearts are chimeras. Transplant
> recipients, who have another person's bone marrow, kidney, or heart
> thumping in their chest, are a kind of chimera, with the cells of
> another
> being living alongside their own.
> .
> .
> See more of the world that matters - click here for home delivery of
> the
> International Herald Tribune.
> .
> < < Back to Start of Article Lines blurred between man and beast
>
> BOSTON In labs around the world, the line between man and beast is
> blurring. Herds of pigs are grown with partly human livers in the
> hopes of
> solving the organ-transplant shortage. Mice with human cells are
> used as
> the new "guinea pigs" for testing drugs or figuring out disease.
> Human
> brain cells are grown inside mouse skulls to help better understand
> diseases like Parkinson's and Alzheimer's.
> .
> Scientists are using such chimeras - animals whose bodies are a
> mosaic,
> with their own cells intermixed with those of another animal - to
> model
> diseases, test drugs on live human cells, and harvest organs for
> transplant.
> .
> But the blending of species also has raised a host of ethical and
> philosophical questions over the past year.
> .
> Last month, the George W. Bush's Council on Bioethics struggled to
> understand when a human-animal chimera is a useful tool, and when it
> becomes "high-tech bestiality." The United States turned down a
> seven-year-old patent application for a chimpanzee-human mix, the
> "humanzee," in February, with patent officers calling on Congress
> for
> guidance. Canada banned the creation of all chimeras last year. And
> the
> National Academy of Sciences is set to release ethical guidelines
> this
> month for researchers who use stem cells to create chimeras.
> .
> "The question is, where does it all end?" said Stuart Newman, a
> developmental biologist from New York Medical College who proposed
> the
> humanzee because he wanted to draw public attention to a morally
> questionable but technically feasible scientific project that might
> follow
> from some of today's experiments. "At some point, everyone will be
> offended."
> .
> Animal rights advocates argue that any manipulation of animals for
> human
> benefit, whether for dinner or for research, is immoral.
> .
> Christian teaching holds that the Bible gives people dominion over
> animals.
> .
> "That really means stewardship - you cannot abuse them for your
> good. But
> just as you would eat a pig or eat a cow, I see no problem in
> putting a pig
> valve in a human being or a pig kidney within a human being," said
> Dr.
> David Stevens, executive director of the Christian Medical
> Association, a
> U.S. group that advocates the practice of medicine from a religious
> perspective.
> .
> The problem arises, Stevens said, when scientists fundamentally
> alter what
> it means to be human or animal. "If you give an animal a human
> brain, if
> you give an animal human reproductive organs, if you make a human
> embryo
> that's not fully human, that crosses the ethical, moral, and
> biblical line."
> .
> The Roman Catholic Church has grave concerns that chimera research
> may
> create beings without a clear moral status. "I think it would be
> basically
> immoral to create a human whose status we could not determine. We'd
> have an
> unresolvable dilemma about how to treat this animal," said Richard
> Doerflinger, deputy director of the secretariat for pro-life
> activities at
> the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.
> .
> The scientists doing work on chimeras see their work as ethical and
> responsible and believe it has tremendous potential benefit.
> .
> Charlotte Kuperwasser, a biologist at Tufts University, created a
> mouse
> with human breast tissue to solve a longstanding problem in
> research, that
> testing drugs by looking at cells in a dish or making a mouse
> version of
> the disease doesn't necessarily help actual patients.
> .
> Mouse cancers, she said, "'don't look like human tumors. They don't
> behave
> like the actual breast cancer. We can cure mouse breast cancers, but
> that
> can't always translate to the clinic."
> .
> By adding human breast cells to immune-deficient mice before
> puberty,
> Kuperwasser has been able to watch normal breast development and
> generate
> human cancers rather than mouse ones in her lab animals. Now, she is
> working to implant particular patients' cancer into mice to see if
> they can
> test drugs and cures on it without harming the person.
> .
> In Nebraska, William Beschorner is working to create a human immune
> system
> and humanized liver in a pig. Eventually the biologist hopes to
> replicate a
> particular patient's immune system and then transplant the pig's
> organs
> back into the person, where they would appear familiar to the immune
> system, and therefore wouldn't be rejected.
> .
> Even scientists pause, though, when experiments creep from basic
> organs to
> the seat of human consciousness - the brain - or when stem cells,
> controversial in their own right, are added to the mix.
> .
> Four years ago, Irving Weissman, a stem-cell biologist at Stanford,
> created
> a mouse with human neurons in its brain, hoping that the living
> model would
> provide insights into diseases like Parkinson's and Alzheimer's.
> .
> The human neurons made up about 1 percent of the mouse brain and
> were
> alive, but it was unclear whether they were functioning. He
> suggested
> another project: creating a mouse with 100 percent human nerve cells
> in its
> brain.
> .
> He asked an informal committee to review his proposal, and the group
> recently drew up guidelines for doing the experiment responsibly.
> .
> Hank Greely, head of that committee, described one clear limit. "If
> you see
> anything that is not unequivocally mouse behavior, you stop the
> experiment," he said.
> .
> Scientists agree that human brain cells growing in a mouse are
> unlikely to
> humanize a mouse because of the vast differences in skull size and
> brain
> architecture. But in a closely related animal, the threat of an
> animal
> floating somewhere between human and animal becomes more serious.
> .
> "What is essentially human is really debased," Alfonso Gomez-Lobo, a
> member
> of the Council on Bioethics, said in March. "I often imagine what it
> would
> be like to wake up one day only to realize that I have the body of a
> chimpanzee."
> .
> A chimera is an animal with its own cells and that of another animal
> growing side by side in its body. Scientists used to call such
> animals
> "tetraparental," meaning they had four parents - their own, and the
> parents
> of the other cells living in their bodies.
> .
> The "geep" is an example of a true chimera. Scientists at the
> University of
> California at Davis fused together sheep and goat embryos. In the
> offspring, every organ, including the sex organs, were made up of
> both goat
> and sheep cells, which meant that one geep could produce both goat
> and
> sheep sperm.
> .
> Many other kinds of chimeras are made by adding human cells to
> animals that
> have been genetically altered to have no immune system. Without the
> immune
> system, which would attack foreign cells, scientists can grow human
> brain
> cells or breast cells in another animal, often a mouse.
> .
> Chimeras surround us, and not just in the lab. Cardiac surgery
> patients who
> receive pig valves to repair their hearts are chimeras. Transplant
> recipients, who have another person's bone marrow, kidney, or heart
> thumping in their chest, are a kind of chimera, with the cells of
> another
> being living alongside their own.
> .
> .
> See more of the world that matters - click here for home delivery of
> the
> International Herald Tribune.
> .
>
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