Human Stem Cells Created by "Therapeutic Cloning" - Assessing the Ethics

New Article on Cloning and Stem Cells by the National Catholic Bioethics Center's Director of Education, Father Tad.

Taken from the NCBC Homepage

To read more articles like this, click HERE

Have a blessed and triumphant Pentecost.

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5/17/13 

Advocates are quick to point out that stem cell research is about helping those who are living. This is not quite correct. Certainly adult stem cell research is about helping the living. Embryonic stem cell research, on the other hand, is about destroying some of the living, namely those who are still young and vulnerable as embryos, in the name of helping others who may be struggling with diseases. Recent research from the laboratory of Shoukhrat Mitalipov at Oregon Health & Science University involving the production of human embryos by nuclear transfer (a form of cloning) relies on this same immoral step of intentional human embryo destruction in the interest of achieving a therapeutic result.

Prior to this breakthrough, human embryonic stem cell research had largely sought to utilize abandoned embryos frozen in liquid nitrogen, “left over” from fertility treatments, to destructively obtain stem cells. The frozen embryo approach was plagued with a persistent difficulty, however. If Jane Doe were to request that a random embryo, stored in the freezer of a local fertility clinic, be destroyed to obtain stem cells to treat some ailment or disease she had, those cells, when introduced into her body, would be seen as foreign because they came from an embryo to which she was not genetically related, and they would be summarily rejected by her body.

"Therapeutic" cloning of the type reported by the Mitalipov laboratory purports to get around the rejection problem by producing a genetically related embryo, that is to say, an embryonic human clone who is a genetic identical twin of the treatment recipient. Starting from one of Jane’s body cells and an egg cell, this new embryonic twin sister would be grown for about 5 days of gestation in the laboratory before being destroyed to extract the desired stem cells. Because identical twins can exchange kidneys and other organs without rejecting them, stem cells taken from the cloned embryo (the younger genetic twin) would not be rejected upon transplantation into Jane (the older twin). Yet producing our own twin brothers or sisters as embryos merely to harvest them for their desired cells – producing life simply to extinguish it – remains a gravely unethical and morally indefensible proposal. Twenty human eggs were used in the attempt to therapeutically clone a patient with Leigh syndrome in Mitalipov’s work, but only two of the cloned embryos ended up yielding stem cells. Numerous human embryos, produced for the explicit and premeditated purpose of their destruction, are typically required for the success of this technique.

We ought not sanction the creation of a subclass of human beings, comprised of those still in their embryonic or fetal stages, to be exploited by those fortunate enough to have already passed safely beyond those early and vulnerable stages. The research from the Mitalipov laboratory represents a turn in the wrong direction for the future of science, and needs to be repudiated as inherently unethical, even more so in light of the continual and impressive progress being made with morally acceptable alternatives such as induced pluripotent stem cells and various forms of adult stem cells.

 

Father Tad Pacholczyk

The NCBC Supports Texas Bill To Protect Vulnerable Persons From Violations of Informed Consent

The NCBC has been working with the Texas Catholic Conference, the Texas Legislature, and other parties, to ensure the protection of vulnerable persons from violations of informed consent in end-of-life care.

In 1999 the Texas Legislature passed the Texas Advanced Directive Act, which was signed into law.  This law contains controversial provisions which could violate not only the right to informed consent, but the right to life of vulnerable persons, such as those with disabilities and those with dementia.  The legislation is better known as the Texas Futility Care Law.  This law allows health care facilities to withhold or withdraw life-sustaining treatment ten days after giving written notice to the patient or surrogate decision-maker that the facility considers the treatment futile care.

In recent years the Texas Catholic Conference has worked dilligently and collaborated with the NCBC and their Director of Bioethics and Public Policy, Dr. Marie Hilliard, as well as the National Catholic Partnership on Disability (of which Dr. Marie Hilliard is a Board Member) to address the ethical problems in the existing statute, as well as to provide protections in the use of Do Not Attempt Resuscitation orders.  

These efforts have resulted in a legislative proposal this session:  S.B. 303: An Act Relating to Advance Directives and Health Care and Treatment Decisions. 

The policy improvements being proposed in S.B. 303 provide significant protections to patients and their families, reflective of incremental legislation.  Incremental legislation is morally licit because, while imperfect,  it significantly improves existing morally problematic law.  Such an approach represents the most that the proponents may achieve in the legislative session. Incremental legislation was recognized as being moral by Blessed John Paul II in speaking of abortion laws, who cites how one: ”could licitly support proposals aimed at limiting the harm done by such a law and at lessening its negative consequences at the level of general opinion and public morality.” 

• [Evangelium Vitae, 1995, par. 73.]

To read more about the NCBC's position on these legislative changes, please read the following letter in support of S.B. 303: 

An Act Relating to Advance Directives and Health Care and Treatment Decisions  

By Dr. John Haas
President
The National Catholic Bioethics Center

Upcoming Events from The NCBC

The National Catholic Bioethics Center's Director of Education, Father Tad Pacholczyk, will be quite busy this month as he represents the NCBC at a number of public events. Please, feel free to take a look at what's coming up and consider attending! 

On Saturday, April 20th, Father Tad will be the keynote speaker at a spring luncheon sponsored by Liferight of Watertown, New York.

Father Pacholczyck will give two talks. One on Loving those who are handicapped followed by Dealing with End of Life Issues.

For more information, click HERE

On April 23rd, Father will be part of a symposium on planning for end-of-life crises in the family. The event will be held at the Ronald Reagan Building in Washington, D.C.

For more information, click HERE

The very next day, April 24th, Father Tad will be in Rosemont, Pennsylvania giving a radio interview about embryonic stem cell research with the In His Sign Radio Network from 5 to 6 P.M. Eastern Time.

You can tune in to the interview online by following the links at their website.

Thank you for your hard work, Father Tad! Good luck and safe travels!

The NCBC joins the fight, takes on Abortion in New York

Keeping up their hard work to foster a Culture of Life, as mentioned in the post below, The National Catholic Bioethics Center has joined hundreds of New York state and national organizations in signing onto a Statement of Principles in response to Governor Andrew M. Cuomo’s proposed abortion expansion act, as well as any other bill that would further liberalize existing state laws on abortion.  The seven Principles simply explain why the people of New York deserve better than a reckless policy of abortion expansion. Dr. Marie T. Hilliard, Director of Bioethics and Public Policy, and a registered nurse with a graduate degree in maternal-child health nursing, cites the irony of how such an expansion is misrepresented as “reproductive health.”  She expresses significant concern for women: 

“ Have we learned nothing from the Kermit Gosnell case, and his abortion house of horrors in Philadelphia? Abortion is an assault on a woman’s well-being, irrevocably robbing a mother of her child. The expanded policies, themselves, speak to a disregard for women for the sake of economics. Allowing late term abortions in outpatient facilities and allowing non-physicians to perform abortions are just two examples of how expansion of abortion policies is detrimental to women. What women need are caring and supportive persons and resources to enable them to be the woman that all women want to be: a caring nurturing source of life, not death.” 

For more information and to see the full Statement of Principles, click HERE  For more information on the signatories, click HERE.

The NCBC Assists in challenging proposed Physician Assisted Suicide Bill

The NCBC Assists the Connecticut Family Institute in challengingproposed Physician Assisted Suicide bill in the Connecticut Legislature.

Dr. Marie T. Hilliard, Director of Bioethics and Public Policy for the NCBC and also Chair of the Ethics/Public Policy Committee of the National Catholic Partnership on Disability (NCPD), assisted the Connecticut Family Institute in securing expert testimony against the proposed physician assisted suicide bill at a hearing of the Connecticut Public Health Committee.  She arranged for, and accompanied Professor Stephen Mikochik, NCPD Board member and Past Chair, as he offered his phenomenal expertise of disability law, as it pertains  to bias and discrimination, in response to this proposal.  Professor Mikochik provided his testimony pro bono, in response to a request from the Connecticut Family Institute, which gathered a diverse panel of disability advocates and health care providers to demonstrate this veiled attack on vulnerable populations under the guise of compassion.  Professor Mikochik's testimony clearly identified the threats to all persons, particularly those with a disabling condition, as well as those with a terminal diagnosis. He was accompanied by Dr. Hilliard, who was present to answer any clinical questions should they arrive.  However, Professor Mikochik was so brilliantly clear about provisions in the bill, that even the proponent of the bill could not respond.  It was reported by Connecticut Capitol observers that Professor Mikochik's testimony was a bellwether event.

You can read more about that testimony HERE

A decision was set to be made about the bill by the end of last week. Thankfully, it has been confirmed that the bill, after stagnating and going without a vote, is gone for sure. For now.

The NCBC works hard to fight attacks on human life in our country. At a time when life is assaulted and tragically violent acts are carried out against our fellow man, The National Catholic Bioethics Center takes up its mission with even greater vigor as it works against the tacit approval of violence and evil that goes unnoticed or masked as 'justice' or 'policy' in our government and our society. While we cannot be physically present in Boston or Newtown, or in every place where violence is done in our world, we hope that through prayer, vigilance, and action, the NCBC can help, in its own way, by fostering and defending the Culture of Life in the United States. 

All our prayers go out to the people of Boston, and to those who suffer violence daily. The NCBC wants the world to know that The Center vows to protect and uphold all human life as sacred.

NCBC Co-Founder Named to Health Care Hall of Fame!

Maurita Sengelaub, a Sister of Mercy, was a co-founder of the Pope John XXIII Medical-Moral Research and Education Center in St. Louis, which became The National Catholic Bioethics Center we know today.

             Sister Maurita

Sister Maurita was inducted into the Modern Healthcare Hall of Fame at a ceremony held at the Hilton Hotel in Chicago on March 10, 2013.  The first woman head of the Catholic Hospital Association, now Catholic Health Association (CHA), Sister Maurita was recognized for her 60 years of leadership in health care.

The NCBC takes great pride in knowing one of their renowned founders has been extended such an honor.

You can read the entire press release on the Hall of Fame induction HERE

You can learn more about the early history of the NCBC, HERE

In recognition of its founder, the NCBC posted a copy of one of our earliest recorded publications: A copy of our monthly Ethics and Medics with a front page letter written by Sister Maurita herself in 1976. This early publication is available to all and can be viewed HERE. Come take a look at this publication and then feel free to visit all of our regularly published articles, HERE

Congratulations Sister Maurita!

Read It!

Please, take some time to read The Center's assessment, composed and researched by our director of Bioethics and Public Policy, Dr. Marie Hilliard, HERE.