Obama to Lift Ban on Embryonic Stem Cell Research
By Susie Madrak Friday Mar 06, 2009 7:00pmThis is such good news - for those people who will be able to afford the treatments that will eventually result from this research. But let's not lose sight of the prize: health care for all!
President Obama is planning to sign an executive order on Monday rolling back restrictions on federal funding of human embryonic stem cell research, according to sources close to the issue.
Although the exact wording of the order has not been revealed, the White House plans an 11 a.m. ceremony to sign the order repealing one of the most controversial steps taken by his predecessor, fulfilling one of Obama's eagerly anticipated campaign promises.
The move, long sought by scientists and patient advocates and opposed by religious groups, would enable the National Institutes of Health to consider requests from scientists to study hundreds of lines of cells that have been developed since the limitations were put in place -- lines that scientists and patient advocate say hold great hope for leading to cures for a host of major ailments.
"Opposed by religious groups?" There are plenty of religious groups who don't oppose embryonic stem cell research - but I guess the Washington Post is so used to having Pat Robertson on speed dial, they think religion is synonymous with GOP talking points.
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Some common sense.
.
Why six weeks? There is no reason this piece of paper couldn't have been ready to sign on day one.
and how many very serious dilemmas can you
handle at one time. priorities! this is
important but not as important as stabilizing
the economy. i am very glad Obama is signing
this executive order.
How difficult is it to stop what you are doing for 3-5 seconds to sign your name?
...for political timing?
because there has been nothing else going on in the country?
WTF?
Right.
All Obama had to do was sign his name. That's it; that's all. This was a campaign promise,and he was elected four months ago.
I suppose six weeks is no big deal, unless you happen to know a person who dies five weeks before a medical treatment is developed which could have helped. And if this research leads to any life saving treatments, you can almost guarantee that there will be people who could have been helped, but the treatment came too late.
But hey, he was too busy to sign his name. You really think that's an acceptable reason?
Christopher Reeves!
Thank you Barak Obama. Your courage and hope is a blessing we should all be grateful for.
Sebelius and stem cell research all in one month. The Operation Rescue folks here in Wichita are going to have their heads explode. Oh wait, they say they don't build bombs anymore.
Just wait for it. You know it's coming.
I wonder who will be first, the Pope or some Baptist.
Of course, I suppose the Pope's busy down in Brazil right now, arguing against giving abortions to 9 yr olds who are pregnant with twins by their stepfathers.
Religion poisons everything.
with all the deceipt and bigotry
from the religious reich wingnuttia
in the last 50 yrs, we can expect some
very serious threats and maybe worse,
bombings coming from these assholes.
they don't tolerate anything they don't
understand and that starts with their
kindergarten readers.
Now maybe we can grow a brain for Rush, a heart for Beck, and some nerve for the Democrat's in Congress...
"and
some nervea spine for the Democrat's in Congress..."I can dream, right?
BTW, thanks for the Wizard of Oz imagery, but I couldn't care less about providing anything for Limbaugh or Beck.
How is this remotely "very, very major"?
This should be filed under "things that sane people do."
The President is removing political bullshit from scientific inquiry.
By the way, before any "stem cells are people too" idiot starts talking, I just want to say that my wife and I just recently saw an ultrasound picture of our in utero embryo (somewhat looked like a gummy bear) and in no way was I conflicted about my pro-choice ideology.
Yay, now we are only 10 years behind the other country's in the world and too broke to fund it, yay.
cheer up ! you just know the rest of the worlds going to share in thier reserch, oh wait never mind! by the time its of any use we will be to poor to need it! !
I am quite pissy tonight. Could someone hand Obama the papers to undo fisa? Can I have the cam disabled in my parents cable box? Still silly tho. Can we possibly end the war in Iraq and Afghanistan now? Could we try to recover the money from wall street and hand every American 3 grand? naw booo. Can the crazy truthers come live in central PA???? hu hu ??? :P
By the way, it should be an executive order because that's how Bush interfered with the process in the first place. Congress could write a law indicating exclusive right of prioritizing research funding should rest with the scientific grant reviews.
It's so strange to have sensible policies coming out of Washington, rather than purely ideological nonsense.
I hope that sick right-wingers will have the integrity to refuse any lifesaving treatment that comes about as a result of this research.
on your new gummy bear! Note, keep the umbilical blood, it's full of stem cells that will be a a perfect tissue match and even more useful if needed.
Imagine what they can do with these. The lady in Spain who had a replacement esophagus put in (they coated a cadaver esophagus with stem cells and her body didn't reject it) is just the beginning.
We might in our lifetime see regeneration of nerves and spinal cords, brain tissue, the ability to grow back portions of body parts and much better skin grafts.
If the religious kooks don't like it, they don't have to use it.
...we're cheating death!
Many people have an overwhelming negative emotional response to the concept of people solving the problem of aging related disease.
Many people imagine that vibrant, youth-like existences beyond our current spans would become repetitive and dull. Somehow ending their dullness becomes societies burden, and offering this choice threatens their plodding path to the grave.
I even hear it told that it is a social obligation to die, and make way for other people's children, or for the planet to heal from the cancer that is humanity. Existence to them is in itself an antisocial act.
I hear stories of children who miss their relatives, and wish to go be in an imaginary place they hear told of in stories meant to comfort, and again see a favorite loved one. I hear of a glorious immortal existence awaiting the obedient.
Yet we mourn the dead, because we know in our hearts that death is really the end of our irreplaceable, special relationship with our loved one.
We will never again see that twinkle in the eye, or that special happy walk, or know that fond embrace.
Advances in technology will solve the problems of biological existence. That is human nature. Dying is for dumb animals.
Sweet Old World by Lucinda Williams on YouTube
We've already lost 8 years. This is huge news.
I was reading that in Germany, they isolated the stem cell that develops the brain. Think about that. They said that its a living cell different from all the others. Yes, all cells are living. Until they die( of course) but this cell is different by the way it lives and develops. They said it actually thinks. Or acts like it thinks.
Now, this has dramatic implications for people with Huntingtons, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's and a wide variety of diseases of the brain.
Not to mention all the other illnesses. So this a day that we all need to remember. The day that a little humanity came back to the USA.
I'm glad thy finally figured out that not using the embryo's from fertility clinics was a waste. And made a damn good argument in favor of this research.
This is one issue that makes me loath GWBoosh. All the people that could have benefited from this. This research is 8 years behind schedule.
that fucking asshole. But hey, his mom jumped to the head of the line to get her heart fixed. There was a time when they said using animal parts and using cadavers was a sin. Fucking assholes..
That I'm not in favor of developing embryo's for research and or use. The fertility clinics should provide ample amounts to use.
Unless , someone wants to donate them. That's their business. Not mine.
Wasn't long ago I read about a man getting a nail stuck through his heart from a nailgun mishap.
Stem cells (cultured from his own tissue, in this case) were introduced to the area, and his heart patched itself up. The bureaucracy of health for the country (I think it was Venezuela) warned the doctors that this effective therapy was unapproved, and that the man should have been placed on a list for a new heart, sentencing him to immune-suppressant anti-rejection drugs for the rest of his shortened life. Glad that man dodged the bureaucrat's bullet.
I hope the FDA will get out of the way of people choosing to access these therapies, instead of foot-dragging to permit their pharma-interest friends to sell drugs.
Thank you Jesus!
Only 26 replies to this wonderful news (two of which were moronic complains) go fucking figure.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2009/mar/01...
We have all the non-embryonic stem cells we need.
How exciting!
"Opposed by religious groups?" There are plenty of religious groups who don't oppose embryonic stem cell research - but I guess the Washington Post is so used to having Pat Robertson on speed dial, they think religion is synonymous with GOP talking points.
Ouch! Great line, Susie!
Good news for John McCain. They just might find a cure for his Alzheimer's in his lifetime.
"We would be 1,500 years ahead if it hadn't been for the church dragging science back by its coattails and burning our best minds at the stake."
[Catherine Fahringer] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_Fahringer
"When the masses become better informed about science, they will feel less need for help from supernatural Higher Powers. The need for religion will end when Man becomes sensible enough to govern himself. We will not, therefore, lose our time praying to an imaginary god for things which our own exertions alone can procure." http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francisco_Ferrer...
[Francisco Ferrer y Guardia, Spanish atheist educator accused by Catholic clergy of leading a riot in Barcelona and executed without a trial. From "The Origin and Ideals of the Modern School", published posthumously]
"No, our science is no illusion. But an illusion it would be to suppose that what science cannot give us we can get elsewhere."
[Sigmund Freud, "The Future of an Illusion", 1927]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sigmund_Freud
Anyone who bothers to do even five minutes of research on the issue of stem cell research knows that it isn't abortion.
Stem cells are taken from voluntarily donated eggs. If the women didn't donate, the eggs would never become babies, but simply flushed out of the women's systems and down the toilet.
That begs a question: why aren't the democrats and the pro-research people telling the facts? Are they themselves uninformed? Do they assume the extreme rightwing voters are so stupid that they can't even grasp this concept? Just what is it exactly that is stopping people from educating others?
Even the most conservative, most fundy-fascist-christian, could grasp the fact that the eggs will never become babies. It isn't, as the saying goes, "rocket science", and it is neither too difficult to understand nor to explain.
Politicians and researchers aren't revealing the facts for one simple reason. Damfino touched on it in his/her post above--drug companies and their lust for money. We all know about politicians with ties to drug companies...well, researchers are also in bed with these same drug companies as a large portion of their research dollars come from those drug companies.
Once again we see how greed trumps all...including overriding the possibility of finding a cure for many insidious diseases.p>
Drug companies, and most medical professionals, are not in the business of curing diseases...they are in the business of the on-going treatment of diseases. Why settle for one payment from a patient/ins. company when you can collect several payments from that patient/ins. company?
You hit it right on the nose. This has always troubled me also. Why are they being quiet. Why are the radicals not doing one bit of research. Sometimes ignorance is contagious.
I'm so happy to hear this. I'm not really for the "living forever" meme that tangentially comes out of it, however. I'm looking at it in terms of people like my ex who developed type 1 diabetes when he was 13 and has had to stick himself several times a day for over 20 years. Like many other diabetics, he's sick of living with it, dealing with the idea that he has to do this day in and day out or he's going to die. He always said he wanted a new pancreas, and stem cells would be able to do that for him and millions of others whose bodies crapped out on them at such a young age.
Someone else mentioned that the drug companies would resist this and I totally agree. Just looking at diabetes alone, there are SO many industries involved that make money off it - the ones who sell the insulin, the syringes, the insulin pumps, the lancets, the glucose meters, the testing strips... and they all cost you a hell of a lot more than what it costs to make them. Diabetes is a huge money-making industry for Big Pharma.
HIP, HIP, HUUUURRRAY!
To all the people who bitched that President Obama had not reversed Bushco rules in his first 48 hours in office, suck an orange.
I knew he would. Only six weeks into his role. He has done more in that time than any other president. On top of all the horrible financial, housing and banking news.
I have hope that I could have a repaired spine by the time I die. I was told in 2001 that I have rotary scoliosis. In two years time, my spine was bent 30 degrees and twisted 10 degrees. The docs wanted to fuse my entire spine both inside and out. I said no. I have already had 15 surgeries to fuse my left ankle and foot. By 2006 my spine had gone to 58 d and 19 d twist.
I have been told by 4 surgeons the past year that it was the right decision for me to not have spine surgery. The disease would have ripped up the joints.
I use a wheelchair outside and a walker indoors. I live on pain medication. Morphine, codeine, soma, etc. $800 per month for drugs out of our pocket. We lost our house last year because of this.
If I am not lucky enough to experience relief, I hope that someone else in the comming years will have the benefits of this correct, and morally RIGHT ruling. The church groups opposing this are the morally wrong boneheads.
I hope this research helps you one day. I really do.
... the article didn't state it clearly, but the point is not that all religious groups oppose stem cell research, but that most/all opposition is based on moral or religious grounds.
What non-religious opposition to SCR is there?
Finally - a pro-life, pro-family President. One who cares about life from inception to old age. So many children and adults will benefit from this research. It's heartbreaking to see young children having to prick their fingers every day because they have diabetes or see children with cerebral palsy being pushed around in wheelchairs by their parents.
At last Science and Common Sense win at least a small victory over Superstition, Nonsense, and Fraud.
With Right to Lifers. Maybe that's a good thing. This will progress under the radar for a little while. But I suggest we get ready for them. They will be showing up.
Here is my response to any that feel this is a bad decision. The rich of this nation have a medical assistance to become pregnant. The leftovers are embryonic cells which are in turn thrown away. These are the people who disagree:
The ill Informed
Pharma
Politicians paid by Pharma
Religious radicals
These groups would prefer the landfill to saving lives.
For the record, there was never a ban on embryonic stem cell research. First president to federally fund embryonic stem cell research? GWBush.
He canceled any fed funding to ESCR. He also wouldn't expand the research. re: any additional ESCR. GwB gets no credit what so ever .
That won't wash. But he did contribute to helping with aids meds to Africa.
He did NOT cancel fed funding for embryonic stem cell research. He decided (since he was the decider) that there would be no federal funding for research with NEW lines of embryonic stem cells. Research on existing lines was fully funded, and continued throughout his presidency.
He wouldn't expand any more than the existing lines of ESCR.
I forget the # of lines that were being researched. Was it 19?
But he wasn't the one who originaly funded these lines. But he did stifle it somewhat. By not expanding it.
As I said up thread, I'm not in favor of creating embryo's for research. But I am in favor of using the existing ones in fertility clinics. Otherwise, they would be thrown away.
They keep them at -240 degrees. But even at that temp, they expire in about 6 months. Thanks for the correction/reminder.
Absolutely correct.
Congress banned federal funding of any research involving fetal tissue back in 1974. In the late 90's the NIH recommended that this ban be lifted. Clinton initially planned to do so, but backed off under political pressure. In 2001, George Bush allowed the FIRST federal funding of embryonic stem cell research, as I said above, but limited it to the existing 21 lines. It was a big deal. He gave a speech on TV that night to explain his position, but apparently I was the only one paying attention to what he actually said.
I understand that it's popular to bash Bush, and there are plenty of things he deserves bashing for, but give the man credit where it is due. False headlines, like the one on this story, only perpetuate the misconceptions people have about his handling of this controversy.
In 1973, Roe v. Wade legalized abortion nationwide. Five years later, the first successful human in vitro fertilization resulted in the birth of Louise Brown in England. These developments prompted the federal government to create regulations barring the use of federal funds for research that experimented on human embryos. In 1995, the NIH Human Embryo Research Panel advised the Clinton administration to permit federal funding for research on embryos left over from in vitro fertility treatments and also recommended federal funding of research on embryos specifically created for experimentation. In response to the panel's recommendations, the Clinton administration, citing moral and ethical concerns, declined to fund research on embryos created solely for research purposes,[38] but did agree to fund research on left-over embryos created by in vitro fertility treatments. At this point, the Congress intervened and passed the Dickey Amendment in 1995 (the final bill, which included the Dickey Amendment, was signed into law by Bill Clinton) which prohibited any federal funding for the Department of Health and Human Services be used for research that resulted in the destruction of an embryo regardless of the source of that embryo.
In 1998, privately funded research led to the breakthrough discovery of Human Embryonic Stem Cells (hESC). This prompted the Clinton Administration to re-examine guidelines for federal funding of embryonic research. In 1999, the president's National Bioethics Advisory Commission recommended that hESC harvested from embryos discarded after in vitro fertility treatments, but not from embryos created expressly for experimentation, be eligible for federal funding. Even though embryos are always destroyed in the process of harvesting hESC, the Clinton Administration decided that it would be permissible under the Dickey Amendment to fund hESC research as long as such research did not itself directly cause the destruction of an embryo. Therefore, HHS issued its proposed regulation concerning hESC funding in 2001. Enactment of the new guidelines was delayed by the incoming Bush administration which decided to reconsider the issue.
President Bush announced, on August 9, 2001 that federal funds, for the first time, would be made available for hESC research on currently existing stem cell lines. President George W. Bush authorized research on existing human embryonic stem cell lines, not on human embryos under a specific, unrealistic timeline in which the stem cell lines must have been developed. However, the Bush Administration chose not to permit taxpayer funding for research on hESC cell lines not currently in existence, thus limiting federal funding to research in which "the life-and-death decision has already been made".[39] The Bush Administration's guidelines differ from the Clinton Administration guidelines which did not distinguish between currently existing and not-yet-existing hESC. Both the Bush and Clinton guidelines agree that the federal government should not fund hESC research that directly destroys embryos.
Neither Congress nor any administration has ever prohibited private funding of embryonic research. Public and private funding of research on adult and cord blood stem cells is unrestricted.[40]
It would appear that we're both wrong, and we're both right.
At any rate, I still fault Bush for letting this drag out for political reasons. This technology will help people. Unfortunately, for a lot of people it'll be to late.
Sorry, I see your point. But I'll never give that man any credit.
He has too many screwups . HUGE screwups. nope. He doesn't deserve any kudos.
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