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Welcome for PPL
Cattle Stem Cell Breakthrough
From the Society Religion & Technology Project
of the Church of Scotland
The Church of Scotland today welcomed the announcement from PPL Therapeutics at Roslin outside Edinburgh that multipotent stem cells have been produced in cattle without using an intermediate embryo. Society, Religion and Technology Project Director Dr Donald Bruce says, "This is an encouraging breakthrough in the search for replacement cells to treat serious diseases without the need to use human embryos. It's obviously still too early to say that this is the solution we've been looking for, but it is certainly a step in the right direction."
For the past 2 years since the isolation of human embryonic stem cells, the SRT Project has advocated that the main focus of stem cell research should be to produce replacement cells direct from ordinary body cells like skin. [See our Discussion Paper on Stem Cells and Therapeutic Uses of Cloning.] Many had queried Roslin's eventual hope to use the Dolly technique to achieve this without going through an intermediate embryo. Now PPL Therapeutics have taken a considerable step towards this by reprogramming cattle cells directly. It provides encouragement that the same thing might now be possible in humans.
There is much support for research to treat serious diseases like heart failure by creating suitable replacement cells. Where embryos are used as the source this poses serious ethical problems, however, stepping over a new ethical barrier. The recent vote in Parliament raised concerns for many, both in the churches and outside, that the embryo would now be used as a mere resource from which convenient parts could be taken. There have been several recent research announcements in deriving stem cells from adult tissue or placental material, which are encouraging many to believe that the use of embryos may eventually be unnecessary. These are very early days, however. It will be some years before anyone knows whether a particular line of research like PPL's will produce a viable therapy, but we are encouraged.
See also SRT's Comments on BBC On-line Website
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Contact : Dr Donald Bruce, SRT Project tel. 0131-240 2250, Fax 0131-240 2239,
srtp@srtp.org.uk
or Church of Scotland Press Office 0131- 240 2243
Dr Bruce is Director of the Church of Scotland Society Religion and Technology Project, assessing ethical issues in technology for Scotland's national church, and a leading authority on the ethics of cloning and genetic engineering. The Kirk is at the forefront of the ethical debate over cloning and stem cell technology and has for several years been in dialogue with Roslin researchers.
