Michael J. Fox and Ron Reagan, Jr. have tossed their lots into the Kerry Camp because of the promise of Stem-Cell research.
I am probably closer to Senator Kerry than to President Bush on this issue. Left to my own devices, I would permit Federal funding to use embryonic stem cells. Yet I fully appreciate the arguments of the opposition. If you believe it comparable to infanticide, you can legitimately complain that your tax dollars are used for it. Yes, of course, my tax dollars fund many things with which I fundamentally disagree, but I will concede that this is a larger difference.
But I ask the Democratic candidates, their supporters, and the media covering this debate to take a realistic, scientifically skeptical look at the issue. Aside: Media skepticism is not mathematically chaotic. It comes and goes at will, but it is unfortunately predictable.
1) As has been mentioned, embryonic stem cells show promise as a possible treatment for Mr. Fox’s Parkinson’s, my Multiple Sclerosis, and Diabetes. Against that, it has been implied that this will also cure Alzheimer’s and any other ailment that concerns the suddenly mortal baby boomers. This is disingenuous.
2) Another cause for skepticism is the latency between research and delivery of a treatment. This is way out stuff folks, which may be an argument for government funding (more on that later) but the Kerry-Edwards campaign doesn’t seem to disrupt the inference of treatments availability on Inauguration Day, provided people make the right choice.
3) One more reminder: President Bush (this troglodyte who will shackle science to pre-Galileo concepts) was the first to ever fund this research. He made some much nuanced restrictions to compromise ethical concerns on both sides. Like it or not it showed the President performing well in an area he was not expected to.
Lastly, let me make one more appeal to free market forces in pharmaceuticals. Adam Smith’s “Invisible Hand” will direct capital to its best and most humane use here. Providing the gub’mint stays out of the way, the stock market will finance the firms that show the most promise on the most common diseases. Is that not the moral choice?
Of course, we could have the government decide which research into which diseases should be funded. “We can’t let profit decide life and death, can we?” Well, yes we can. The market would look at potential profit (return), funding the most promising developments (lowest beta) for the most prevalent diseases (largest market). If we let our wise Legislative Branch disburse the funds, I feel Senator Lott will find some promising research in Mississippi, Rep. Maxine Waters will fund sickle-cell-anemia, and Rep. Frank (and many others) might be tempted to over-fund AIDS. Those accusations are broad and probably unfair, but my point holds – politics is far inferior to profits as a mechanism to allocate, morally, research investment.
I'm the mother of 2 diabetic sons. They're now 17 & 19 and were diagnosed 16 years ago at 15 months and 3. I agree completely with your points about the Pres's stem cell research approach, but I think you left out an important point.
The most immediately promising research (i.e. research that is yielding real results at this point in time) is coming from adult stem cell research. I haven't studied how it's doing toward a helping MS (my husband's aunt and the daughter of a close friend have MS), but it looks very promising for diabetes. So far, ESC's keep growing into tumors.
By making the ESC funding limitations a political issue, the point is being missed that the more immediately promising research is in ASC.
Posted by: Peggy at October 6, 2004 07:50 AMThanks for the comment, Peggy. There are several promising alternatives to ESC -- yet another reason why the Democrats' promises are disingenuous!
Posted by: jk at October 6, 2004 11:20 AMAnd ESC research is not "illegal," it just doesn't get any federal funding.
I call this one miniscule step in the right direction, as there is no moral justification for ANY federal funding of scientific (or any other) research.
The enabling principle that permits such funding is that government has a 'right' to reach into our wallets and take whatever is 'needed' for the 'general welfare.' This idea is only defensible to the extent that we don't question it.
Posted by: johngalt at October 6, 2004 11:50 AMWell, actually, it does get Federal funding -- but it is limited to the number of lines of cells available at the time it the decision was made. The actual number is the source of much contention.
But you can do research on existing lines of cloned cells with Fed ##, but you may not create new embryos.
Posted by: jk at October 6, 2004 11:59 AM