"Without knowing more clinical detail, there's little that I can say," said Steve Goldman, chairman of the Department of Neurology at the University of Rochester in New York. "In more general terms... I remain concerned about the long-term safety of unpurified grafts of embryonic stem cell derivatives. Time will tell."
Yes, in addition to the ethical controversy, there are still a number of concerns that need to be addressed scientifically about using stem cells. If these cells are always turned "on" for division, for instance, what will stop their rapid cell division and growth? Uncontrolled cell growth is usually called cancer. Or, leaving aside that unlikely outcome, what if reprogrammed cells just somehow lose their programming? What happens if a mesoderm stem cell differentiated into ectodermal tissue reverts back? All of these are questions that have been posed at various points in time, and not just in the lay literature opposed to stem cell research, as you can see from Dr. Goldman, above. Another worrisome factor has been contamination of the stem cell lines. This has actually been reported, and was cause for concern about the present stock of embryonic stem cell lines which scientists have been using for the past decade. In 2005, a group of researchers at UC San Diego and the Salk Institute in La Jolla reported in the journal Nature Medicine that they found solid evidence that human stem cells were contaminated with non-human sialic acid as a result of the culture media which was using non-human serum to sustain the cells. Subsequent work by Robert Lanza, et al. was published in The Lancet reporting a new embryonic cell line that was grown without serum feeding and therefore less likely to be contaminated. Yet the original group's finding draws attention to the fact that there is much that needs to be refined in the field of stem cell research. How that refinement will occur without federal research dollars may turn out to be very unfortunate for anyone who needs stem cell treatment. With only private sector funding of embryonic stem cell research and therapies, one can only imagine the simply exorbitant costs that these therapies will be have when they finally are offered. It will truly be medicine for the wealthy, no doubt.
There is much argument about whether embryonic stem cell therapy is safe, is ethical and even whether it is likely to be effective. What is clear, however, is that if funding is not available to sufficiently research and test, even if in non-human subjects1, that the likelihood of success on any level is poor. When contamination was reported in cell lines in 2005, within months Robert Lanza's group at the private firm American Cell Technology reported not just a potential way to grow cells without serum, but within a year, a way to extract the inner mass stem cells without destruction of an embryo. Research findings drove the science of stem cell technology forward.
If we don't publicly fund medical research in this country there will be two devastating outcomes: we will fall farther and farther behind the rest of the world, and we will end up with novel treatments that only the very wealthiest Americans will be able to afford.
Think of anyone you know who has any of the ailments in that figure above, who might potentially be treated by stem cell therapy. How much is too much to pay?
So hopefully, when you next hear 'stem cell research' you'll ask what kind of stem cells and you'll ask whose research it is. Is it publicly funded and therefore yours, mine and ours? Or is it privately funded? And how about just saying "Yay! More research!"
Research and peer review drive science, and medicine, forward.
They are your very best hope for a healthy future.
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