Taking Sides: Therapeutic Cloning
Aug. 6, 2001 -- Cloning. The very word stirs images of identical humans, spawned from the cells of one individual. But some experts think the House of Representatives, in voting against all types of human cloning last week, threw away an opportunity to do some real good.
Here are two arguments, from an ethicist who makes that case, and a congressman who co-sponsored the bill that passed. You can read them, then weigh in with your thoughts.
The essays are the opinions of the writers alone and not of ABCNEWS.
In Opposing Cloning, the House Overreaches
By Ronald M. Green
On Tuesday, July 31, by a vote of 265-162, the House of Representative passed HR 2505, a bill that outlaws all forms of human cloning in the United States. The bill bans not just reproductive cloning — the effort to produce a genetic replica of a person — but therapeutic cloning as well.
Therapeutic cloning is one of the most promising areas of medical research. It combines nuclear transfer (cloning) technology with human stem-cell research. Stem cells are all-purpose cells found in the early embryo that can be stimulated to become more specialized cells for tissue repair or replacement.
In one very recent report, stem cells injected into a paralyzed mouse partially repaired a spinal cord injury and allowed the mouse to walk. Just this week, British researchers announced that they had induced human embryonic stem cells to form pancreatic tissue. This provides hope that youngsters suffering from juvenile diabetes might receive replacement insulin-producing cells. Untreated, this illness can lead to heart disease, stroke, kidney failure and blindness.
Small wonder that scientists and patient groups are excited about stem-cell technology.
But there is a technical problem. Since stem cells come from embryos that have their own distinctive DNA, the recipient might well reject tissues produced in this way. To prevent this, clinicians could administer powerful immuno-suppression drugs. But these drugs have their own risks, such as increased susceptibility to infections or cancer.
Therapeutic cloning would eliminate these problems. The mother of a diabetic child could donate an egg from one of her ovaries and its nucleus would be removed. A body cell could be taken from the child and its nucleus inserted into the egg. Stimulated to divide, this would soon reach the 100- to 200-cell stage, at which point it could be dissected to produce stem cells.
These cells could then be induced to become insulin-producing tissues and injected back into the sick child. Since the DNA of the cells is the same as the child's, the cells would not be rejected.
Why would anyone oppose this extraordinarily promising line of research? The objectors have two worries. First, many see the early "clonal" organism as morally protectable — the equal of children of adults — and they oppose its destruction for therapeutic purposes. This is so despite the fact that the tiny, nearly microscopic cluster of undifferentiated cells is not the result of normal fertilization and could not exist outside of a laboratory.
The opponents are entitled to their views, but all Americans do not share them. The real question then is why some people's views of the moral status of this very early form of human life should trump others' equally sincerely held beliefs or health care needs?
A second concern of the opponents is that research on therapeutic cloning will help scientists perfect nuclear transfer technology and hasten the day when reproductive cloning becomes feasible. At first sight, this seems to be a legitimate worry, but it doesn't withstand closer scrutiny.
Therapeutic cloning research is already legal in Britain, where it was approved last January by a large majority of Parliament. This means that we cannot possibly prevent the increase in knowledge about human cloning technology that will be widely reported in the international science press. By banning therapeutic cloning in this country we only deprive ourselves of the medical benefits that therapeutic cloning may bring.
Article 3 of HR 2505 renders it unlawful for any person to import "any product" derived from a clonally produced organism. If this provision goes into effect, five or ten years from now the mother of a diabetic child in the United States will either have to forego a lifesaving therapy for her child, or will have to travel to the United Kingdom to seek a therapy denied her at home. HR 2505 will make Americans medical refugees.
There is still time to prevent all this. A second House bill offered by Rep. James Greenwood, R-Pa., would have banned only reproductive cloning. The Senate must now take a position if any bill is to become law. It should follow the lead of the Greenwood bill and reject HR 2505.
Professor Ronald M. Green, director of the Institute for the Study of Applied and Professional Ethics at Dartmouth College, is the author of numerous books and articles and a noted religion educator. He has also served as a government panel adviser on the ethics of federal funding for human embryo research.
One Scientist's Essay on Why it Makes Sense to Clone Humans.
Group Says Ready to Clone by November
Message Board: Join the debate over therapeutic cloning.
Preventing a Brave New World
By Dave Weldon
Human cloning is about the commodification of human life, the manufacture of babies to pre-ordained specifications, and a new battle in the fight against eugenics and a post-human era.
Cloning could be used to reproduce living or deceased persons without their consent.
Sponsored by myself and Rep. Bart Stupak, D-Mich., and passed last week in the House by a substantial bipartisan vote, The Human Cloning Prohibition Act of 2001 (HR 2505) does NOT ban the cloning of DNA, cells (other than embryos), tissues, plants, or nonhuman animals.
This bill bans neither gene therapy nor in vitro fertilization, nor does it affect stem-cell research on sexually produced embryos (with sperm and egg).
Since the cloning of the sheep named Dolly in 1997, accomplished by placing a body cell nucleus into an enucleated egg, a Massachusetts company has begun experiments aimed at creating cloned human embryos for research.
Scientists with Clonaid, of the extraterrestrial Raelian movement, based in Canada, as well as an international consortium of scientists led by reproductive researchers Panos Zavos, a professor emeritus of reproductive physiology at the University of Kentucky, and Severino Antinori, a fertility doctor in Italy, announced their intention to create cloned children, despite significant genetic abnormalities with ALL cloned animals (95 percent to 97 percent are either stillborn, or extremely malformed and disabled).
Despite widespread opposition to creating non-cloned embryos solely for research purposes, some scientists want to create cloned embryos solely for research — in hopes of using them for what is called "therapeutic cloning." There are today, however, no therapies derived from animal embryo cloning, and it is speculative whether there ever will be, let alone from human cloning. Alternatively, human adult stem cells have been successfully used in over more than clinical trials.
A "reproductive cloning"-only ban would license cloned embryo farming. That would mean for the first time the destruction of nascent life would be required by law — and would actually prove ineffective and unenforceable.
Because cloning would take place within the privacy of a doctor-patient relationship, and because the transfer of embryos to begin a pregnancy is a simple procedure, it will be nearly impossible to prevent attempts at "reproductive cloning" once cloned human embryos are available in the laboratory. Once they're in the womb, will the federal government force abortions?
HR 2505 had support from many on the left and the right. Pro-choice feminist Judy Norsigian, author of Our Bodies, Our Selves For the New Century, the Council for Responsible Genetics, the United Methodist Church, and the National Conference of Catholic Bishops all support a full ban.
More than 84 percent of Americans want to ban all human cloning. Given the stakes, the House passed the only bill that accomplishes this.
Rep. Dave Weldon, a Republican, represents Florida's 15th congressional district, is on the House of Representatives' Science Committee, and is also a practicing physician.