LETTERS: ADULT STEMP-CELL RESEARCH HOLDS MEDICAL PROMISE

To the editor:

Recently the news has been focusing on the value of stem-cell research using embryos from in-vitro fertilization and embryos killed by abortion. Now we hear that scientists are creating embryos for destruction in order to harvest cells.

I guess the news people are a little lazy, or they would check all the data on stem cells, including research on adult stem cells. The public does not have access to science journals, so it should be the job of the media to research these journals for the rest of the story.

There have been amazing advances in research using non-embryonic stem cells. Human patients were successfully treated for heart disease using stem cells from their own arm muscles. Umbilical cords offer a vast source of repair material for fixing damaged brains. Stem cells from adult bone marrow of rats and mice created new heart-muscle cells and blood vessels. Researchers created human bone cartilage and muscle tissues from human fat cells. Brain stem cells taken as long as 20 hours after death from cadavers up to 72 years of age were induced to proliferate, and bone marrow can form almost any cell type: liver, brain and so on.

Such discoveries mean real cures for debilitating conditions are possible in the foreseeable future, but with few exceptions the national media have been loath to admit that embryos are anything more than disposable tissue. Maybe they are afraid the precarious edifice of abortion rights could topple and the great god, science, might be restrained by conventional and outdated morality.

HARRY BARRY

Cape Girardeau