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Stem Cell Injections Pioneering Step Forward?
sanspeak writes "Indian Doctors at All India Institute of Medical Sciences have performed a radical new operation of sorts by pioneering the method of stem cell injections. Ishika Gupta, a seven month old girl child who was suffering from cardiac myopathy, was treated by injecting stem cells into her heart from bone in her own leg. AIIMS has marked a global first in pioneering stem cell medicine by the "injection method''." From the article: "There will now be a national stem cell centre at AIIMS which will coordinate the research and its applications. The statistics speak for themselves. After six months, 56% of the affected (dead muscle) area injected with these cells had shown improvement." Additional details on this therapy available from the Fort Wayne News-Sentinel and Medical News Today.
My wife is pregnant right now and we are going to have to make the choice if we want the 'stem cells' harvested from the cord after birth. I realize that there are costs involved, but is it worth it? Gut feeling says that if I don't I could regret it later. Any thoughts?
It could be worse, it could be Monday.
> When is an embryo "life"?
Peter Singer addresses these concerns in some of his books, including the excellent `the president of good and evil` (about Bush) and `Writings on an ethical life`. His conclusion in the former is that Bush is inconsistant - he seems to value the `life` of an embryo above the lifes of Iraqi civilians, for instance.
I just want to make sure we're clear.
That also means that a baby grown outside of the womb has no protections.
That also means we can farm developed fetuses for destructive research that might yield great benefit. You could even go further and grow them beyond any arbitrary period (e.g., 9 months for example). Since they've never been "born", and have never been wanted by a parent, it's not a "life" by your definition. And if such research could hold untold answers to questions and benefit for mankind, why should we not do it?
I just want to make sure you're being logically consistent here.
uhmm... you do realize that the process of in-vitro fertilization requires the use and eventual destruction of dozens of embryos right? the majority of stem cells used in research have come from these fertilization centers with the full consent of the couple trying to have a baby. if they aren't used for research they are a) stored for potential siblings or b) destroyed.
seems to me the question has already been answered decades ago. stem cell research, just like gay marriage, is nothing more than a buzzword to whip up moral indignation amongst conservative christians, and boy does it ever work.
The NIH even publishes guidelines on how to keep your embryonic stem cell research from impacting your other funding.
Clear, Dark Skies
There is no controversy over human stem cells in general, just human embryonic stem cells in particular. The paper reporting the first derivation of these sorts of cells was published in 1998 so the whole question was moot before that point. As they are now most commonly derived, a human embryo must be destroyed in order to generate these cells. This is problematic for those who, like me, believe that human life begins when the haploid gametes come together to form a diploid organism. At this point, the genetic identity of the individual is set--though twinning can still occur. Interestingly, there are now research proposals out there to extract one cell from the morula stage (That's 8 cells, I think, but don't quote me) in a way that does not destroy the life of the organism. As of a month ago, there have been no clinical trials featuring human embryonic stem cells based on a search I did on Medline. There are over 900 trials featuring human stem cells of other sorts, presumably mostly hematopoietic stem cells. The first was published in 1976, then one each in 1982, 1984, and 1989; then nine in 1990, three in 1991, ten in 1992 and the number of papers published yearly has increased every year since then. From 1991-1995, 95 papers were published; from 1996-2000, 374 papers were published. Between 2001 and the end of 2004, 439 papers have been published. There are considerable technical hurdles involved in adapting embryonic stem cells for use in patients. They tend to undergo uncontrolled growth for one thing and this makes them more likely to form tumors. A researcher in Minnesota claimed, several years ago, that she had found "the ultimate stem cell"--one that can become anything and is found in the bone marrow, but I haven't heard much about it since then.
This is myt view on your questions:
1. When is an embryo "life"? Moral Question
2. At some arbitrary time? Repeat of qustion 1
3. When it's in a woman's womb? Repeat of question 1
4. When it's "wanted" by someone as the product of actions to create a child? Repeat of question 1
5. When and how does it become life? Repeat of question 1
6. What's the magic cutoff? Repeat of question 1
7. When and why is it ok to destroy it? Legal Question
8. When it can exist on its own? Irelivent or just another repeat of quesiton 1
What does "exist on its own" mean? slightly clarification of question 8
so breakling that down you have 2 questions
1. When is an embryo "life"? Moral Question
2. When and why is it ok to destroy it? Legal Question
since 1 is a moral question its none of the governments buisness. So we are left with 1 question
1. When and why is it ok to destroy it? Legal Question
which legaly is a matter of rights. The thing that needs to be decided first is when does an embryo have rights.
Dogs are alive but we can kill them when we feel we don't want them legaly because they have no rights.
"- There isn't a "ban" on any kind of stem cell research in the US. There is a restriction on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research - entities are still free to perform embryonic stem cell research (see California's recent US$3 billion bond initiative to support such research in the state)"
No, no institute which recieves federal funding FOR ANYTHING can conduct such research. There are not many research facilities that aren't recieving federal funding for at least ONE project. This is effectively a ban.
"- The Bush administration is the first administration to allow any federal funding at all for embryonic stem cell research. Granted, this is partly due to timing, but it's still a point of information."
It is called a Red Herring, it is a rhetorical device along similar lines to the subject at hand (that Bush has banned embryonic stem cell research in any facility that receives federal funding for ANY type of research) designed to distract you from the actual topic and lend pseudo-logical strength to an argument.
"- When is an embryo "life"? At some arbitrary time? When it's in a woman's womb? When it's "wanted" by someone as the product of actions to create a child? When and how does it become life? What's the magic cutoff? When and why is it ok to destroy it? When it can exist on its own? What does "exist on its own" mean? I'm not saying any of these things necessarily should preclude embryonic stem cell research, and indeed, federal funding for it. But doesn't it seem that those ethical questions should be addressed or at least considered? It may well be that society collectively decides that the benefit outweighs ethical concerns. But bear in mind, too, that farming more developed human life for research would no doubt yield untold answers to questions that might hold great benefit. Does that mean we should do it? If not, why is that any different? Scientifically, it would seem clear that it's a life the second the embryo comes into being..."
Scientifically the cells are alive before they ever join to become a fertilized egg. Scientifically each of the millions of skin cells each of us has die everyday are life. We kill living cells when we mow our lawns or take anti-biotics.
Scientifically moral and ethical issues do not exist, it is people who create these artifical constructs. Humans attribute a uniqueness or addional value to their own lifeform.
However, since this ignorance is not likely to change soon we can consider natures answer. Nature has created a reference point for us, it exists in all complex lifeforms. It is at this point that multiple simple lifeforms can be considered a complex lifeform. It is called birth. Of course if something is raised entirely artifically (which we can't do now with humans) we can roughly call it at a full development term (9months for humans).
The parent is right. Neupogen is used to increase the production of white blood cells. That would increase the number of T-cell precursors and B-cells in the blood. The B-cells are already mature, but the T-cell precursors mature further in the thymus. They're still not stem cells per se. It'd be pretty complicated to separate the precursor cells from the mature cells that would centrifuge out along with them, so I'm pretty sure they just wanted to transfer white blood cells.
Iraq invading Kuwait had *nothing* to do with ancient ties, or ancient fueds, or any of that.
Those lines are simple sophistry and revisionism.
Fact #1. Pre-Invasion, Iraq was $13-14B in debt to Kuwait.
Fact #2. Pre-Invasion, Iraq was heavily in debt to other OPEC nations, including Saudia Arabia.
Fact #3. Iraq wanted to pay off its debt by raising oil prices through OPEC. Kuwait thwarted this attempt, and fought for increaed production and thus lower prices.
Fact #4. Most of Iraqs useful ports had been damaged or destroyed during the Iran-Iraq war. Much of Iraq's ability to ship oil was reduced. Kuwait held valuable undamaged ports away from hostile Iran along the valuable Persian Gulf coast.
Fact #5. Hussein publically called his move an attempt to re-assembly the Bablyonian empire. It was imperialism by his own definition.
Regardless of what you think about anything else, the Kuwait invasion was not justified in any sense whatsoever. It also appears likely now that Hussein was high on narcotics during the run up to the invasion of Kuwait.
Regarding your claim about the US killing more Iraqis than Hussein, it's virtually utter tripe.
For one thing, his pure neglect of his people in the fact of vast wealth is astounding. Beyond that though, his virtual single-handed instigation of the Iran-Iraq war cost no less than 1.5 million lives directly and perhaps millions more indirectly.
Whether and embryo is alive or not is not in question. It is. But so are bacteria, ants, fungi, etc.
Whether a human embryo belongs to the human species isn't in question either. It does. But so does the stuff you wipe off yourself after watching porn.
What is in question is if a couple of cells in a Petri dish (not even a fetus yet) should have the same rights and consideration as a person.
Would you kill a cockroach if you found it in your kitchen? Of course you would. Yet the cockroach is a much more advanced organism than that embryo.
As far as I can tell, the arguments against stem-cell research are purely religious.
Actually, it's probably more acurate to say at any point in the development when all biological functions are developed and the fetus can survive on it's [sic] own.
Does that mean premature babies aren't alive?
I am Sartre of the Borg. Existence is futile.
Neupogen IS the drug used to increase WBC, but
apparently it also increases stem cell count in the marrow to the degree that stem cells escape into the peripheral blood.
The docs told me they were stem cells and googling
neupgen stem cell transplant yields similar stories, for example:
http://www.flex.com.au/~kaye/Patexp.html
As my brother's bone marrow is going to be destroyed by chemotherapy, I hope they know what they are talking about.
The BIG mystery to me is how the machine works without twisting up the lines. There are 4 tubes connected to the main centrifuge tube; everything is plastic and discardable, but the main centrifuge tube spins. I can see how one would connect one line up with a spin decoupler, but more than one would have to get twisted as far as I can see. Maybe they are nested with multiple spin decouplers.