ABC News' Jake Tapper is reporting that President Obama will move on Monday to lift former President Bush's ban on federal funding for research on embryonic stem cells.
"President Obama will hold an event at the White House in which he signs an executive order overturning the ban," Tapper says. "The announcement will be about 'restoring scientific integrity to health care policy,' an administration official tells ABC News."
Bush's order had allowed funding on research for stem cell lines already in use, but that proved to be much less valuable than he'd promised. He'd also vetoed efforts to lift the ban.
One side effect of Obama's move could be a political disadvantage for Democrats. Stem cells were the best social wedge issue Democrats had found, and it was one that proved to be pretty effective.
Although the exact wording of the order has not been revealed, the White House plans an 11 a.m. ceremony to sign the order repealing one of the most controversial steps taken by his predecessor, fulfilling one of Obama's eagerly anticipated campaign promises.
Obama ends Bush ban on embryo stem cell research
ReplyDeletePresident will end restrictions on government funding for research crucial for developing new medical treatments
* Daniel Nasaw in Washington
* guardian.co.uk, Friday 6 March 2009 23.38 GMT
Barack Obama will overturn an important medical research policy of George Bush's presidency on Monday, by ending restrictions on federal funding for embryonic stem cell research which scientists consider crucial for the development of new medical treatments.
The move was confirmed yesterday by the White House, rescinding a ban put in place by Bush in August 2001.
It is the latest in a series of actions by the president casting aside some of Bush's most divisive policies. Throughout his tenure Bush was accused of substituting ideology for scientific evidence on issues such as stem cell research, energy and birth control. In 2007 Obama, then a senator, said Bush's obstruction of stem cell research was "deferring the hopes of millions of Americans who do not have the time to keep waiting for the cure that may save or extend their lives".
Overturning the ban on funding will cheer patients, doctors and scientists, who maintained that it was a politically motivated act that ignored science.
"I feel vindicated after eight years of struggle, and I know it's going to energise my research team," said Dr George Daley of the Harvard stem cell institute and children's hospital of Boston. "Science works best and patients are served best by having all the tools at our disposal."
Katie Hood, CEO of the Michael J Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research, said: "Our foundation is optimistic about the work that will now continue toward better treatments and cures for the millions of people impacted by injury or disease."
Embryonic stem cells are prized in medical research because they can develop into any kind of tissue.
Medical researchers hope to use the cells to find cures for conditions such as juvenile diabetes, Parkinson's disease, Alzheimer's disease and spinal cord injuries.
But the research raises profound ethical questions, because human embryos - typically conceived in vitro - are destroyed so that stem cells may be harvested. Conservatives say it creates human life only to end it. The research is allowed in Britain, which in the years since Bush's restrictions, has become a world centre of stem cell study.
Although US public opinion was strongly in favour of the research, Bush yielded to his conservative backers in 2001 and banned federal funding for it except on stem cell lines that already existed at the time. He said the work was "at the leading edge of a series of moral hazards". Scientists questioned the promise of those existing cell lines, and said the ban on funding for the cultivation of new stem cells hindered research.
Obama's executive order will re-energise social conservatives already angry that Obama rescinded a ban on US funding for foreign aid groups that provide or advise on abortions.
"Today's news that President Obama will open the door to direct taxpayer funds for embryonic stem cell research that encourages the destruction of human embryos is a slap in the face to Americans who believe in the dignity of all human life," said Tony Perkins, president of the conservative Family Research Council.
In the years since Bush's ban, scientists have sought ways to work with stem cells that avoid the ethical dilemmas associated with the embryonic type.
British and Canadian scientists said earlier this week they had found a way to reprogramme skin cells, effectively winding back the clock on the cells until they reached an embryonic form.
Obama ends Bush ban on embryo stem cell research
This article was first published on guardian.co.uk at 23.38 GMT on Friday 6 March 2009. It was last updated at 01.54 GMT on Saturday 7 March 2009.
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http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/mar/06/embryonic-stem-cell-research-obama