Nobel laureates write to President Bush

Abstract

The debate over federal funding of stem-cell research continues. Many eminent US scientists, including 80 Nobel laureates, recently wrote an open letter to President George W. Bush stating their support for the use of embryonic stem cells for scientific research in the USA. The letter, believed to be the largest collection of Nobel signatures ever sent to a US President, supported NIH guidelines for the use of stem cells and requested federal funding of the research, which is currently unavailable in the USA. The authors of the letter cited a number of proven benefits of the technology, notably successes in correcting neurological defects in mice, and pointed out that adult stem cells have not yet been proven to have the same capabilities for differentiation as compared with embryo-derived cells. The ethical implications of the work were acknowledged, but the scientists said that the widespread production of viral vaccines using foetal cells over the past 35 years sets a precedent for the work. They also stated that it would be ‘tragic to waste the opportunity’ to investigate something that could be of such great therapeutic benefit. Further correspondence from, among others, the American Association for the Advancement of Science has also advocated federal funding of stem-cell research. This renewed round of lobbying came as the NIH prepared to award grants for research using stem cells. Federally funded laboratories are not permitted to cultivate stem cells, but privately funded scientists can. President Clinton introduced legislation that would allow federally funded scientists to use stem cells isolated from adults but not from embryos. D.S.