BID TO EXTEND EMBRYO RESEARCH

PA News
Freitag, 17. November 2000 15:07:00 


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By Sian Clare, Political Staff, PA News
The Government today defended controversial plans to extend embryo research in
a bid to help scientists find new treatments for a range of diseases.
Ministers want to allow embryos to be used for stem cell research which
scientists believe could lead to new treatments for Parkinson's disease,
multiple sclerosis, spinal cord injuries, Alzheimer's and insulin dependent
diabetes.
But the move is opposed by right-to-life anti-abortion groups, those who
oppose IVF treatment and some religious figures who are against any research on
human embryos.
Opening a debate on the issue in the Commons today, Health Minister Yvette
Cooper promised a free vote for MPs and peers on the regulations which would
extend the Human Embryology and Fertilisation Act 1990.
Ms Cooper said the Government's decision followed a report from the Chief
Medical Officer which said embryonic stem cell research was vital to find
treatments for a wide range of diseases.
But she stressed that the same strict rules which already applied to existing
embryo research would apply to stem cell research.
As opponents rose to interrupt her speech, Ms Cooper insisted: "I recognise
and respect the fact that many MPs will feel as a matter of conscience that they
need to vote against these regulations.
"But I would also point out that I believe the moral arguments cut both ways
and there are also strong ethical arguments in favour of these regulations given
their potential to relieve the suffering of many thousands of families in this
country.
"There are also many MPs like myself who feel that as a matter of conscience
we need to vote in favour of these regulations."
Ms Cooper stressed that the changes would not legalise reproductive cloning.
"It is absolutely untrue that these regulations will give the go-ahead for
reproductive cloning. Reproductive cloning is illegal. It will stay illegal,"
she said.
The Government wanted to embed this ban on reproductive cloning in primary
legislation because people across the country found it unacceptable, she said.
But she said the 1990 Act already allowed so-called therapeutic cloning, where
embryos were created by cell nuclear replacement, under the strict rules of the
Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority.
Ms Cooper said it would not be legal to use embryonic stem cells in medical
treatment, but if scientists could find out how they worked it may be possible
to re-programme adult stem cells.
"That could be in the end the Holy Grail that could allow huge breakthroughs
in terms of treatment of degenerative disease," she said.
This might lead to treatments to replace lost heart muscles, replace liver
cells in cases of hepatitis, replace bone cells in patients suffering from
osteoporosis, repair nerve cells in those with heart disease and stroke, replace
insulin producing cells in cases of diabetes and changing outcomes for those
with spinal cord injuries and MS.
She said 50,000 people suffered from spinal cord injuries in Britain, with
most injuries occurring in people aged 15-35. This could lead to paralysis and
there was no cure yet.
Some 120,000 people suffered from Parkinson's, with one million people caring
for them. Some 1.4 million had insulin dependent diabetes and, in those with
childhood onset diabetes there was the prospect of an early death.
She speculated that a cure for Alzheimer's would leave Britain's nursing homes
empty.
Ms Cooper stressed that embryo research was currently only allowed for five
reasons: advances in treatment of infertility, increasing knowledge about the
causes of congenital disease, increasing knowledge about the causes of
miscarriage, developing more effective contraception and for helping to detect
the presence of gene or chromosome abnormality in embryos before implantation.
Embryo research is only permitted up to 14 days or before the first signs of
neural development and only if the HFEA is satisfied that the use of embryos is
necessary for the purposes of the research.
Otherwise the HFEA will not grant a licence for the research project.
In most cases the alternative to research would be to let the embryos perish,
and thousands of embryos created for IVF were not used every year.
She stressed that the strict constraints of the 1990 Act would remain and the
HFEA would still have to licence every research proposal. The HFEA would also
have to ensure that the use of embryos was necessary for the research and that
it could not be carried out any other way.
Tory health spokesman Philip Hammond warned that public opinion had woken up to
some of the potential dangers of the advancement of science.
The BSE and GM furores have caused public opinion to re-evaluate the role of
science in our society, Mr Hammond said.
"I would suggest the age of deference to science is over. In many areas it
will seem to many people that science has failed us and that the lack of proper
control over scientific activity, always of course with the great benefit of
hindsight, is obvious."
Mr Hammond went on: "I think it would be very dangerous indeed for scientists
if science were to constantly be pushing ahead of where the body of society is
comfortable and happy to be.
"It is incumbent upon those who seek to make these moves to seek to carry
public opinion with them.
"With the benefit of hindsight, it is entirely obvious now to the lay person
it is unnatural to adopt cannibalistic feeding practices in agriculture. The
very thought seems abhorrent but it wasn't apparent to us at the time.
"We are entitled to ask ourselves whether the scientists should have been
focusing on it before they were."
He argued: "I suspect the majority of the population until relatively
recently had somehow assumed that science was looking to their best interests
and was able and prepared to protect them."
On GM crops, he said it must be obvious that field scale crops are an
irreversible action.
"There is a sense that society, that science, has been moving ahead of the
political and moral consensus. My fear is that those of us mere mortals ... are
being asked to sanction actions on the basis of potential outcomes while history
teaches us that the potential outcomes may be very different from those which
are envisaged.
"We are being asked to move rapidly into uncharted waters before many of us
feel sufficiently sure of the consequences to make decisions which have such
potentially far reaching consequences."
Mr Hammond added that "whether we like it or not" embryo stem cell research
is "going to happen".
Mr Hammond said he did not believe adequate proof had been put forward to
overcome real moral concerns about "where this road will lead us".
He added: "When the issue comes to a vote, my current intention is that I
shall vote against it."
Dr Peter Brand (Lib Dem Isle of Wight) said there were moral and ethical
arguments on both sides of the case.
But all the scientific arguments were on the side of an extension to the 1990
Act.
Dr Brand said he hoped MPs would not try and "re-run" the 1990 Act or the
Abortion Act.
"I find it very difficult where members' personal, deeply felt opinions form
the framework for denying other people opportunities.
"We should be guided by our own beliefs but I have some difficulty when those
beliefs are imposed on others," he said.
defended the Government's proposals and
insisted that therapeutic cloning was totally different from reproductive
cloning.
He spoke of the living hell experienced by Parkinson's sufferers and the
problems for their carers and the hope that new cell-based treatments could
offer them and future patients.
"I've had to get to grips with the consequences of Parkinson's disease over
the last 12 years," he said.
"If the quality of life of some of our constituents could potentially be
massively improved by stem cell research, then haven't we got a moral obligation
not to walk by on the other side -- to use a Christian analogy -- and ensure that
that research is carried out," he added.
Mr Thomas said later that a member of his family has Parkinson's, but declined
to say who.
Tory Ann Winterton (Congleton), a leading right-to-life anti-abortion
campaigner, accused the Government of using "spin" and propaganda to promote
the changes.
She also accused the bio-tech companies of making threats that they would quit
the country, laying off employees, in a bid to get the law changed.
She stressed that reproductive cloning was already illegal, and the Government
was introducing fresh legislation against it as "a smokescreen".
Mrs Winterton claimed MPs were seduced by the "promises" of experts with cures
for degenerative and genetic diseases in 1990.
"Ten years later we are still awaiting the realisation of their promises,"
she said.
"The empty words of these experts has resulted in the destruction of
countless human embryos. As members we have to be more realistic in our
assessment of scientists and doctors."
She said Britain was "totally out of step" with rest of Europe because
cloning is outlawed in several countries.
Urging the House to oppose the move, she claimed the matter was never fully
debated in 1990 and that surely was an "abuse" of Parliament.
said: "The benefits that my be achieved in healing the
sick in this case outweigh the downside of using cells that might have the
potential for a full human life.
"So if the Government asks Parliament to decide on a free vote, I will have
the moral confidence to exercise my judgment in favour of extending research on
embryos to include therapeutic as well as reproductive purposes."
Mr Key added: "If we can hold out hope for some alleviation of the miseries
of such diseases as Alzheimer's then, being human, we have a duty to do so.
"If this involves cell transplant or genetic manipulation, then let us pursue
such goals.
"Let's recognise that in changing some genes, in some human beings, we are
not changing human nature."
said 20 years of
research on animal embryo stem cells indicated that research on human embryo
stem cells would be highly productive.
He told opponents of the research: "You may well feel that you do not want
any therapies for you and your young children, if that came up, from these
sources. But this is a question of saying what we would want to be available, by
consent, for other people."
It would be unethical to ban such research in this country but then accept
therapies for Parkinson's and diabetes derived from such research in other
countries.
If the research was ethical, then British scientists must be allowed to carry
it out.
He told Mr Hammond: "You will otherwise be faced with the difficulty of
deciding whether for you personally or for your constituents you can support
therapies for diabetes or Parkinson's disease that have been derived from work
on early embryos that you've decided shouldn't be allowed to take place in this
country.
"I think that would be an unethical position to take. If you don't like the
research you are in fact saying you don't want the benefits of that research if
it should be successful."
Winding up for the Government, Ms Cooper said she was sorry Mrs Winterton chose
to see "conspiracy" everywhere with the idea the Government was able to
co-ordinate the views of the British Medical Association "far from the
truth".
She stressed that it was important further Parliamentary debate took place
before a vote on the matter and called for a clear regulatory framework.
"I would agree that cloning of human beings is morally wrong and
unacceptable," she said.
But on the issue of therapeutic cloning, research suggested "strong promise"
for stem cell research which could deliver "immense" human benefits.
On an ethical basis, MPs should reflect on their own consciences, she said.
"It is right, I believe, that science for good and not evil means science in
an ethical and legal framework and I believe that's what the 1990 Act provides.
"I would strongly urge people not to vote against these regulations simply as
a statement of their anxiety about the BSE Inquiry or GM foods, because it is
such a different issue."
Ms Cooper added that in Europe, some countries had no legislation on stem cell
research while some had prohibited it.
If a regulatory framework were not in place, research could go ahead in
countries where there was no regulation at all, or on a private basis.
"Not only does this deny the prospect of UK expertise and brilliance in this
area being applied ... it also leads to the prospect of this kind of research
being done almost entirely in the private sector," she added.
"It is considerable responsibility that lies on the shoulders of those in
both Houses as we consider these issues."

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