Both sides take stem-cell debate to Southeast students

Experts on both sides of the embryonic stem-cell debate made their case to Southeast Missouri State University students Thursday night.

More than 100 people listened as Lindsay Holwick of the Missouri Coalition for Lifesaving Cures and Dr. Michael Wulfers of Missourians Against Human Cloning gave slide shows supporting their views.

Missouri voters will weigh in on the charged issues when they vote on Amendment 2 on Nov. 7. A vote in favor of the amendment would change the state constitution to prevent state officials from restricting that research.

Holwick said a "no" vote would hold Missouri back from capitalizing on potentially life-saving and lucrative scientific discoveries.

"Whether or not we do it here in Missouri does not stop this research from going forward in other states. ... We will lose the doctors and scientists at Washington University who now compete with Harvard in this field," she said.

Holwick added that her passion for the amendment was personal. Her cousin was paralyzed after breaking his neck while diving into a pool. She believes research on embryonic stem cells could one day help him walk again.

But the failure of Amendment 2, she said, would open the doors to state legislators who have sought to criminalize the research in the past. "His first footsteps would be into a jail here in Missouri if he sought a cure for his spinal paralysis," she said.

Wulfers, who has been a physician in private practice since 1983, said the opposition's argument amounts to a redefinition of human cloning. He said anyone who looks at an egg fertilized through sexual reproduction and compares it to an egg fertilized through a process used in stem-cell research called "somatic cell nuclear transfer" would be unable to see a difference.

"This is a scientific question, not a religious question. We're asking, 'When does life begin?'" he said. He pointed to a slide of the textbook he once used in medical school which said the development of a human being begins with fertilization.

The majority of questions after the presentation were critical of Wulfers' arguments.

Lanson Debrock, a student in a master's program and graduate of Notre Dame Regional High School, said he was, as a Catholic, to be against stem-cell research, but his personal life has caused him to question this belief.

"After I had a son born with genetic problems that he could live with for the rest of my life, my feelings changed," he said. "My wife and I would do anything we could to find a cure for him. I would hate to see Missouri vote against this and miss out on the next penicillin or the next polio vaccine."

tgreaney@semissourian.com

335-6611, extension 245