Embryonic stem cells, as their name suggest, are derived from human embryos. These cells are grown in laboratory, which is known as cell culture. Embryonic stem cells have the potential to become any cell type in the body, which make them very special. Furthermore; since these stem cells have the potential to become any cell type in the body, it means that they also have the potential to replace damaged tissues. However, although stem cell research can result in great scientific and medical gains, pro-life activists and many religious groups argue that it is immoral and unethical to destroy human embryos in the name of medical science—making the human embryonic stem-cell research topic very controversial.
Shirley Wright, an assistant professor of biology at the University of Dayton in Ohio, points out that “Embryonic stem cells form at a very early stage in human development…” (352). She also notes that these embryonic stem cells “are first clearly recognizable about five to seven days after fertilization, when human embryo forms a structure called a blastocyst” (Wright 352). She argues that at this stage there is little indication that this fluid-filled sphere “could develop into a complete person” (352).
But from where are embryonic stem cells harvested and why are these cells so special? According to Wright, “in November 1998, the world learned that human embryonic stem cells had been successfully grown in cell culture” (352). Cell culture is the process by which cells are grown in controlled conditions in a laboratory. Wright also suggests that these “undifferentiated human cells have the potential to develop into any cell type in the body,” furthermore, “people with illnesses or injuries requiring the replacement of tissue—any tissue—need not worry about finding a suitable donor” (352). She argues that since these stem cells have the potential to develop into any cell type, they also have the potential to replace damaged tissues.
There are many potential good that could come from therapy using harvested human cells, Wright points out some of them, “”people need no longer suffer the consequences of heart attacks, Alzheimer’s disease or diabetes when compatible heart tissue, neurons and pancreatic cells can be grown in a culture dish” (352). She argues that such visions could be fulfilled with stem-cell technology. As a son-in-law of a woman who suffers from high blood pressure, who miraculously was able to find a suitable kidney donor for her transplant that ended years of painful dialysis sessions, stem-cell technology is very important to me. If genetics play a role in high blood pressure, my wife and her offspring have a slight chance of inheriting high blood pressure, but she might not be as lucky as her mother. But if the vision of replacing damaged tissues with harvested human stem cells is fulfilled, then the need to wait for a suitable donor would no longer be necessary.
Alas, although stem-cell technology can result in great scientific and medical gains, there are some moral and ethical concerns, as Wright acknowledges, “about setting the boundaries for this research” (360). She claims that some people “argue that it is unethical to harvest embryonic stem cells from human embryos because human life has not been respected” (361). Furthermore, Wright also claims that assuming more cells will need to be collected “some fear that companies will support in vitro fertilization clinics and abortion clinics for the acquisition of embryos and aborted fetal tissue” (361).
Furthermore, there are others such as Patrick Lee, director of the Franciscan’s Institute of Bioethics and author of “Abortion and Unborn Human Life’” who argues the immorality of destroying human embryos and early fetuses, and claims that people are intrinsically valuable because of who they are, essentially, a human and physical organism; therefore, he states, “what is intrinsically valuable (as a subject of rights) comes to be at conception” (Lee 250). He adds that it is wrong to kill someone at any developmental stage, including at the fetus and embryo stage when he outlined that “what makes it wrong to kill you or me now would also have been present in the killing of you or me when we existed as adolescents, as toddlers, as infants, but also when we existed as fetuses and embryos” (Lee 250). Lee urges that human embryo and fetus have the capacity for higher mental functions, although, they cannot immediately perform such acts. He claims that embryos and fetuses are members of a natural kind, as oppose to canine or feline embryo, and that if they are not prevented by some intrinsic cause they can develop the capacity for mental functions.
Lee’s argument regarding the moral status of embryos and fetuses, however, is challenged by Jeffrey Reiman, professor of philosophy at the American University in Washington, D.C., who contends that “Lee confuses the nature of a process with the nature of its result,” and that “a process of quantative change can produce a change in substance” (1 of 14). Reiman claims that although a human fetus and a rational person, as he calls it, share the same essential properties, which are being a physical organism, but are not the same substance “because they do not share all the same essential properties” 3 of 14). So, in contrary to Lee, Reiman suggests that embryos and fetuses do not have the moral status as an adult human because they lack the essential trait of rationality.
As a person who is neither pro-life nor pro-choice to an extreme, I believe that the government should be more rational. In most States, abortion is allowed within the first trimester. Within that time frame embryonic stem cells are able to be captured and cultured. If the mother has made a legally allowed decision to abort the embryo or fetus, wouldn’t it make sense to allow scientist to experiment on a soon to be discarded embryo, as long as it only has the “potential” to become a person. Moreover, if such researches can one day lead to the cloning of necessary tissues and neurons that might save millions of Americans, isn’t it fair to say that stem cell research should be federally funded.
Fortunately, on November 11th, 2007, Marie McCullough, a staff writer for the Philadelphia Inquirer, reported a major stem-cell advance. She reported that “two studies reprogrammed human skin cells, a step that could overcome ethical concerns” (A1). In her report two separate research teams “announced that they had reprogrammed ordinary skin cells to behave like embryonic stem cells...” (A1). Such breakthrough is of great importance because, as McCullough reports, it “could overcome ethical and scientific obstacles to the dream of regenerative medicine” (A1). Although this breakthrough is still at a very early age, it is really promising. If Thompson, a scientist at the University of Wisconsin, and Yamanaka, another scientist working on a similar project from the University of Kyoto in Japan, are successful reprogramming skin cells and giving them the characteristics that make embryonic stem cells so valuable, implies that scientist will no longer need to destroy five-day-old human embryos trying to obtain stem cells, thus, ending the ethical and moral debate.
Works Cited
Wright, Shirley J. "Human Embryonic Stem-Cell Research: Science and Ethics." American Scientist 87.4 (1999)
Lee, Patrick Abortion and Unborn Human Life The Catholic University of America Press (1996)
REIMAN, JEFFREY "THE PRO-LIFE ARGUMENT FROM SUBSTANTIAL IDENTITY AND THE PRO-CHOICE ARGUMENT FROM ASYMMETRIC VALUE: A REPLY TO PATRICK LEE." Bioethics 21.6 (2007)
McCullough, Marie "Major stem-cell advance reported." Philadelphia Inquirer, The (PA) 21 Nov. 2007
