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Prominent scientists support stem cell research WASHINGTON (March 18, 1999 6:55 p.m. EST http://www.nandotimes.com) - Seventy-three prominent scientists, including 67 Nobel prize winners, signed a letter supporting plans by the National Institutes of Health to consider financing research with stem cells that originated from human embryos. The letter, to be published Friday in the journal Science, said that despite the opposition of more than 70 members of Congress, the NIH position on human stem cell research "is both laudable and forward-thinking." Stem cell research, the scientists said, could be used to treat heart disease and brain disorders and could "perhaps even cure" diabetes. The letter is the latest volley across a growing chasm of disagreement separating medical researchers who say stem cell research offers great promise from members of Congress who believe the research is immoral because it starts with aborted human embryos. The lawmakers support a ban on federal funding of human embryo research and say that ban includes stem cells. Pluripotent stem cells are the master cells from which all body tissue develops. During gestation, the cells change into the 210 types of cells that make up the human body. Privately funded researchers recently took cells from aborted or unused embryos no longer needed for invitro fertilization and they grew colonies of pluripotent stem cells. In some experiments, the cells differentiated into other types of cells, supporting the theory that heart, brain and other tissue could be grown from such cells. Citing the promise of stem cell research, Dr. Harold Varmus, director of the National Institutes of Health, proposed in January that the agency consider funding such studies. He said the research may not violate the federal ban because it would use existing stem cell colonies and not involve working directly with embryos. An NIH committee is being selected to evaluate the ethical concerns. In their letter in Science, the 73 scientists said Varmus' plan "succeeds in protecting the sanctity of human life without impeding biomedical research that could be profoundly important to the understanding and treatment of human disease." Stem cells, the letter said, could be used to make "a long list of cells and tissues that could be used for transplantation." New cells could be injected to restore ailing hearts, or to correct damage by Parkinson's disease, or to replace failed insulin-producing cells, and, thus, cure diabetes, they said. If Congress blocks this research, the letter said, "these tremendous scientific and medical benefits may never become available to the patients who so desperately need them." In reply, the leader of an antiabortion group in Congress, Rep. Christopher H. Smith, R-N.J., said: "Some scientists resent any moral limits on their use of taxpayer funds for harmful experiments." "I reject the claim that a degree in science - even a Nobel Prize in science - makes scientists our supreme arbiters of morality and human dignity," said Smith, who leads a group of 70 Congress members who have written two letters opposing Varmus' plans. The congressman said medical experimenters have committed "horrific abuses" in the past. Addressing the scientists, Smith said: "Americans will not endorse lethal experiments on infants just because you claim it would be useful. We should not start down that road now." Among those who signed the scientists' letter were Nobel laureates Dr. Robert F. Furchgott of State University of New York, 1998 winner for discovery the action of nitric oxide in the body; Eric F. Wieschaus of Princeton, 1995 winner for studies of genes in developing fetuses; Joseph E. Murray of Harvard, 1991 winner for studies on cell and organ transplantation, and James D. Watson of Cold Spring Harbor Laboratories, co-discoverer in 1953 of the DNA molecule. By PAUL RECER Copyright 1999 Nando Media Copyright 1999 Associated Press http://www.nandotimes.com/noframes/story/0,2107,29277-47063-350358-0,00.html janet paterson - 52 now /41 dx /37 onset - almonte/ontario/canada <http://www.newcountry.nu/pd/members/janet/index.htm> [log in to unmask]