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How do we answer questions re:Udall bill and human fetal transplant? Wouldn't it make sense to amplify and accentuate the research being done with pig tissue transplant(PTT)? Does the Udall bill specifically discuss human fetal tissue transplantation? I am not sure what the status of PTT is today? Has anyone read news, or follow-up studies on this subject? I will search cyberspace, perhaps others could do the same and report back to the group. My current information is: 1. 4/19/95 the first patient underwent the operation at Lahey Hitchcock Clinic, Burlington. The surgeon was Dr. James M. Schumacher. The results of were expected to be known in 6-9 months. The FDA approved this experiment. 2. At the Univ. of Colorodo, Dr. Curt Freed called the experiment "very exciting", adding "if it is effective, this will be a wonderful development". 3. Scientists have shown that they could transfer brain tissue from one species to another with relative ease. Dr. Ole Isacson of McClean Hospital, Bellmont, Mass. collaborated with the Lahey team. Dr. Isacson said that under the microscope, dopamine-making cells from pigs and people are strikingly similar. "The new thinking we developed is that the brain is more adaptable than we previously thought. Cross-species transplants might someday to be used to treat other degenerative brain disorders, including Huntington's disease and Alzheimer's disease." The controversy regarding this method to treat Parkinson's disease is mainly an ethical debate about abortion of human fetuses. This linkage with the abortion issue is unfortunate since the use of human cells is probably not necessary, or even desirable, for applying this transplantation method to patients. First, development of a major medical treatment that will rely on the event, or availability, of aborted human fetal donor tissue is undesirable. Second, the use of human fetal tissue may be associated with infection risks to the patients with implants. Third, techniques for coordinating and handling aborted human fetal brain tissue have proved to be difficult, and may not be provide a large enough number of surviving dopamine cells for patients to recover from the disease. To overcome these problems, fetal cells from non-human fetuses (such as porcine) or other biotechnology derived nerve cells can likely be developed as safe and effective alternative cell sources for transplantation to patients with neurodegenerative diseases. _______________________________ Dr. Isacson is Associate Professor in the Program in Neuroscience at Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital and Director of the Neuroregeneration Laboratory MacLean Hospital, Belmont, MA 02178. This article was prepared as an invited commentary on controverisies in transplantation for Parkinson's disease. -------------------------------- Regards, Margaret Tuchman