In an article in yesterday's Sunday New York Times (Nov 15,1998 p.25) President Clinton is reportedly concerned about the experiments on embryonic stem cells and has directed the National Bioethics Advisory Commission to review the medical and ethical considerations of the work that is being done. The latest creation is part human, part cow stem cells. A political consideration "is the ban on Federal financing of fetal research. The ban, imposed by Congress, has created the situation that university scientists, who mostly depend on Federal money, cannot work on the human embryonic stem cells wheras the private sector may conduct whatever research it pleases." Human embryonic stem cells, as readers of this List already know, "can develop into any of the body's 210 types of cells, a process that happens naturally during fetal development." Geron, a company doing this research, hopes to grow cells in the laboratory that can be injected into patients suffering degenerative diseases such as Parkinson"s. According to the NY Times the ethical problems of this research are also important because of the source of the stem cells. "In one case the cells came from excess pre-implantation embryos created in infertility treatments, and in the other from aborted fetal tissue. Both sources were legal but research using the first would have been ineligible for Federal money." __________ Sid Roberts 68/3 <[log in to unmask] > Youngstown, Ohio