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I simply want to share with you the comments that I made in calls and emails to Senators Hillary Clinton and Charles Schumer, my two senators here in NY State, regarding S.5, a bill now up for a vote, which would provide funding for crucial medical research now underway. Please read my comments below, and if you agree, please call your senators today, and urge them to support S.5. Thank you very much, Gather. As you know, Senator, stem cell research holds unprecedented potential for new treatments and cures, which would help millions now suffering with many diseases. I am one such person, having been diagnosed with Parkinson's disease in 2001, at the age of 47. I understand that there is a bill, S.5, which includes funding for stem cell research. Some have moral issues with some cutting edge research, such as stem cell and nuclear transfer and tissue replication (so-called cloning techniques). I favor US government involvement and funding of such research, in light of the fact that such research is going to go on, with or without US funding. I think that the best way to oversee the process and ensure humane methods is to be involved, and not to reject and ostracize such important and inevitable work. But however stem cells are obtained or produced, it is critical at this time that maximum funding be awarded to those carrying on this noble and vital research. If the emphasis is to be on the living, on life, let it be on lives now being lived. People with disease are not cursed or inferior, and we have the very same rights as anyone else in our land. Indeed, according to law, living, breathing, tax-paying citizens are supposed to have rights which are not extended to biological material, including embryos routinely discarded by fertility clinics. To withhold funding from stem cell research serves no earthly purpose, and it relegates millions of living citizens to a status somewhat below such medical waste. This is not fair, and it's not right. It's not moral to deny us this opportunity to possibly regain more healthy, unafflicted lives. Therefore, I urge you to support S.5, and all other efforts to bring more support to those engaged in stem cell research, and in other groundbreaking research which holds so much potential to relieve the suffering of millions of citizens now alive. Thank you. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask] In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn