Is steam cell research a good or bad thing and why?

Answer:
Through careful work, adult stem cells could be used to repair a damaged brain or heart, rebuild a knee, restore injured nervous system connections

The great advantage of embryonic stem cells is that they can differentiate into 210 different types of tissue.

Heart Disease - German heart specialist Bodo Eckehard Strauer successfully treated a heart patient, using stem cells from the man鈥檚 bone marrow. Dr. Stauer said, "Even patients with the most seriously damaged hearts can be treated with their own stem cells instead of waiting and hoping on a transplant" ("Stem cell therapy repairs a heart," London Daily Telegraph, August 25, 2001).

Heart Disease - "Four out of five seriously sick Brazilian heart-failure patients no longer needed a heart transplant after being treated with their own stem cells" ("Stem cells used to repair heart tissue," MSNBC News, September 8, 2003).

Sickle Cell Anemia - CBS鈥?60 Minutes II reported on 15-year-old Keone Penn, whose physicians at the University of Pittsburgh say was healed of sickle cell anemia with an injection of stem cells from umbilical cord blood. According the report, "the stem cells changed his entire blood system from type O to type B" and eliminated the sickle cell problem ("Stem cells from umbilical cord blood used to save a boy鈥檚 life," CBS broadcast transcript, November 28, 2001).

Acute Myeloid Leukemia - Sixteen-year-old Nathan Salley told a U.S. Congressional subcommittee how stem cells from umbilical cord blood saved his life ("Teenager testifies he鈥檚 鈥榣iving proof鈥?of stem-cell option," Denver Post, July 22, 2001).

Multiple Sclerosis - Thirty-six-year-old Susan Stross is one of more than 20 MS patients whose conditions have remained steady or improved after receiving an adult stem cell transplant. The same results are reported with several hundred patients worldwide ("Already saving lives, stem cell research may soon be in full swing," Seattle Times, August 20, 2001).

Non-Hodgkin鈥檚 Lymphoma - Forty-year-old Mark Fulford was not able to receive a bone marrow transplant; so doctors used stem cells from umbilical cord blood ("Different kind of stem cell already saving lives," Denver Rocky Mountain News, August 18, 2001).

Parkinson鈥檚 Disease - "Jefferson researchers have early evidence of bone marrow stem cells able to become brain cells" (Thomas Jefferson University news release, November 12, 2001).

Improved Stroke Recovery - "Cells from the blood of an umbilical cord help rats recover from stroke faster, new study finds" (University of South Florida Health Sciences Center News Release, November 8, 2001).

Blood Stem Cell Transplant - "Transplantation: Surgical team uses standard stem cell procedure in unique way for kidney recipient" (Blood Weekly, March 7, 2002).

In a breakthrough trial, 15 young patients with newly diagnosed type 1 diabetes were given drugs to suppress their immune systems followed by transfusions of stem cells drawn from their own blood.

All but two of the volunteers in the trial, details of which are published today in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), do not need daily insulin injections up to three years after stopping their treatment regimes.



The negatives are the ethical, moral %26 legal use of embryonic stem cells.







38 states recognize that life begins at conception and 25 states already regulate embryo and fetal esearch. Ten states ban harmful embryonic research altogether. Louisiana designates IVF [in vitro fertilization] derived embryos as judicial [legally recognized] persons. Maine, Michigan, and Massachusetts impose up to five years of imprisonment for harmful research on live embryos or fetuses.

Five states restrict the sale of embryos, five more restrict sale for research, and eight others prohibit sale for any reason. Some of these laws might have changed as this is old research.

What do you think is this a good thing.

From everything that I have read it seems that this might be as close to a miracule cure as has ever been.

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