The media continues to hype the miraculous promise of embryonic stem cell research (more accurately describe as destructive embryonic stem cell research) and virtually ignore the actual progress being made in developing effective therapies from adult and umbilical cord stem cells. The problems with destructive ESCR are growing and no useful therapies have been developed yet. Wesley J. Smith reports on the latest developments.
By contrast, there is a steady flow of good news from the realm of stem cell research from adult cells and umbilical cords.
- Scientists have used umbilical cord blood stem cells to restore feeling and mobility to a spinal cord injury patient who's been a paraplegic for 19 years.
- Adult stem cells were used to develop a therapy that cured mice with advanced juvenile diabetes.
The really tragic thing is that there are limited research dollars available from private and public sources, and so far the media's false hype has encouraged support of what seem to be fruitless research instead of funding research producing measurable results.
Opponents with ethical objections to destructive ESCR are often portrayed as being against progress. But not only do we have valid ethical concerns, the evidence is mounting for perfectly ethical lines of research.
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