Just as the Obama administration has promulgated federal funding rules for embryonic stem cells, Forbes magazine reveals The Dirty Secret of Embryonic Stem Cell Research
Hope for any benefits from ES research is decades away.
Thomson blamed simple biology. Among other problems, ES cells require permanent use of dangerous immunosuppressive drugs. They have a nasty tendency to form tumors both malignant and benign including teratomas--meaning "monster tumor." Teratomas can grow larger than a football and can contain eyeball parts, hair and teeth. Yech!
OK, so how many "decades?"
"The routine utilization of human embryonic stem cells for medicine is 20 to 30 years hence," embryonic stem cell research advocate William Haseltine and then-chief executive officer of Human Genome Sciences.
Others say 'three to five decades' or 'never in my lifetime'.
Meanwhile adult stem cells (AS) have proved to be just as flexible as embryonic stem cells (ES) without the health concerns or moral baggage.
AS cells have now treated scores of illnesses including many cancers, autoimmune disease, cardiovascular disease, immunodeficiency disorders, neural degenerative diseases, anemias and other blood conditions. They've been used in over 2,000 human clinical trials. There has never been an ES cell clinical trial. Former National Institutes of Health director Dr. Bernadine Healy, once an ES cell research enthusiast," now calls them "obsolete."
That's why it hardly makes sense to vastly increase federal research funding for ES cells. Medical research spending is always a zero-sum game. However big the overall budget, every dollar approved for one grant is a dollar lost to others.
UPDATE; Researchers produce cells they say are identical to embryonic stem cells
Two groups of Chinese researchers have performed an unprecedented feat, it was announced today, by inducing cells from connective tissue in mice to revert back to their embryonic state and producing living mice from them.
By demonstrating that cells from adults can be converted into cells that, like embryonic stem cells from fetuses, have the ability to produce any type of tissue, the researchers have made a major advance toward eliminating the need for fetal cells in research and clinical applications.