Kentucky University's Success Shows Embryonic Stem Cells Unneeded by Michael Janocik
by Kentucky Post
[Pro-Life Infonet Note:  Michael Janocik is the assistant director of the Right to Life Educational Foundation of Kentucky.]

The Right to Life Educational Foundation of Kentucky enthusiastically congratulates the University of Louisville on its recent success in the field of adult stem cell research. We are hopeful about its potential to cure Parkinson's and spinal-cord injuries. U of L scientists will now add their achievement to the long and growing list of discoveries attesting to the possibilities of adult stem cell research.

We are elated by this progress, but not surprised. For years we have championed the potential therapeutic benefits of adult stem cell research as a morally acceptable alternative to embryonic stem cell research, which destroys the lives of tiny human beings.

It is noteworthy that U of L's achievement is reported in the wake of the human cloning battle in Frankfort, in which the university played a prominent role in defeating anti-cloning legislation. The pro-cloner's argued that banning human cloning would force Kentucky universities into the last century and hinder them from attracting top-drawer scientists and limited research money.

Yet apparently, without human cloning technology, U of L has stepped into the future with some of the finest scientists in the country. This is the first of many ironies.

While the pro-cloning lobby was deceiving Kentucky legislators that it is necessary to allow human cloning, some of its own scientists, just 50 miles away, were pursuing successful alternatives which demonstrate that it is not.

While the Courier-Journal of Louisville was reporting that the universities would lose research money if Kentucky banned human cloning, research on adult stem cells at U of L was advancing and has now garnered considerable public and private funding.

While the an editorial in the Louisville newspaper was rebuking "anti-abortion extremists" for destroying hope, the hope of adult stem cell research was flourishing, and now there is hope to cure Parkinson's and spinal cord injuries without destroying human life.

While pro-cloners were searching for results to buoy their "therapeutic cloning" speculations, real advances in stem cell research occurred within the walls of their own institution.

While cloning sympathizers were mocking pro-lifers as uncompassionate zealots for trumpeting the morally acceptable alternative of adult stem cell research, scientists at U of L were investing their compassion and resources into that which those "zealots" proposed.

As remarkable as it is, U of L's success is only one of hundreds of promising adult stem cell discoveries all around the world.

Nevertheless, its triumph is still muted with the caveat, "but scientists believe the embryonic stem cells hold more promise." Never mind the fact that embryonic stem cells have never developed, let alone been extracted, from cloned human embryos.

The bioethical debate surrounding human cloning and embryonic stem cell research compels us to consider at least two important things:

•  First, that adult stem cell research provides a feasible, even superior, morally acceptable alternative to human cloning research.

•  Second, the debate has nothing to do with abortion.

Pro-cloners persist in characterizing the debate as the compassionate scientific community against the "anti-abortion zealots." The strategy is as hackneyed as it is cowardly — turn your opponents into monsters so you can ignore their arguments. Admittedly, they have employed it with some success, but in the end the strategy must crumble: As U of L's success shows, the truth does prevail.

Pro-lifers recognize, respect and defend every human being's inalienable right to life.

It should come as no surprise that those who respect human life in the womb do so also in the laboratory. We know that an assault on any innocent human life is an assault on every human life.

Our human dignity requires that we strive for solutions that respect the inestimable value of every human being. If we fail in that endeavor by employing a utilitarian philosophy in the service of killing some to help others, we will have revoked our claim to freedom and equality.

As the front of human cloning is opened in the war on human dignity, it is tempting to despair that we have forfeited those claims. But U of L's success gives us hope that we can achieve great things while respecting the right to life of each human being.

We urge U of L to relentlessly pursue the morally superior avenue of adult stem cell research and we want nothing less than a complete restoration of the health of those who live with unspeakable suffering. By rejecting the utilitarian seductions of human cloning research we will go a long way toward the restoration of our dignity.

From:  The Pro-Life Infonet <infonet@prolifeinfo.org>
Reply-To:  Steven Ertelt <infonet@prolifeinfo.org>
Subject:   Kentucky University's Success Shows Embryonic Stem Cells Unneeded
Source:   Kentucky Post; August 15, 2002