Friday November 22, 2002
FOUNDING STEM CELL RESEARCHER ADMITS EMBRYONIC STEM CELLS WILL NOT BE USED FOR THERAPIES
Astonishing Admission Indicates Foolishness of Previous Hype
WASHINGTON, November 22, 2002 (LifeSiteNews.com) - All the public promises and Congressional testimony vowing amazing cures to come from the use of embryonic stem cells have proven hollow with an astounding admission by one of the world's foremost embryonic stem cell scientists. John Gearhart, who gained international recognition in 1998 when he successfully extracted human pluripotent stem cells from aborted fetal tissue, said at a recent conference: "I am not sure these cells are going to be used in therapies."
Gearhart, director of research for Johns Hopkins University's Department of Gynecology and Obstetrics, insisted however that embryonic stem cell research should still be allowed in order to learn how to work with adult stem cells from the patient's own body. Speaking November 14 at the "Human Embryonic Stem Cells: Differentiation and Transplantation" conference convened by the National Human Genome Research Institute, Gearhart said, "I am not sure these (embryonic stem) cells are going to be used in therapies, but we are going to use the information we get out of this research to get the patient's own cells and work with them to get them to do what we want. This is really where I see the future now."
Dr. John Shea, Medical consultant to Campaign Life Coalition Canada told LifeSite that the statement by Gearhart is likely "a covert admission that the promises made of the wonders to come from embryonic stem cells were false and foolish." Dr. Shea explained: "they are probably beginning to face the fact that they will not be able to overcome the rejection problem with embryonic stem cells and that the cloning method they proposed to avoid rejection has been discounted since the vast abnormalities exhibited with cloning." Gearhart's next attempt to justify the controversial embryonic research is to piggy-back on the real promise of ethical adult stem cell research, says Dr. Shea. "The game is up, and I think they are preparing the public to soften the blow to their ego," concluded Dr. Shea.
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