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Church of Scotland

Looking at the ethics of technology for a New Millennium

Stem Cells : Are Adult or Placental Cells a Viable Alternative to using Embryos?

In the run up to the vote in Parliament in December 2000, there was much confusion about whether we do or do not need to use embryos to produce human stem cells. Since the first isolation of human embryonic stem cells in November 1998, there has been much excited talk of the potential to use them to make replacement cells for a wide range of otherwise untreatable conditions. Major concerns have also been raised by the Church of Scotland and others, however, about the ethics of using embryos in this way.

This has led some to argue that stem cells derived from adult cells like bone marrow or from placental blood, should be used instead of embryos. A umber of people, including Cardinal Winning on a Radio 4 Today programme, made the assertion that adult stem cells would be able to do all that embryonic stem cells can do. This is unfortunately running ahead of the science, and we should be careful not to raise false hopes.

A scientific conference in October 2000 at the Royal Society Edinburgh brought together most of the world's top experts on stem cells and cloning. The potential for adult derived material was discussed in depth, but they were cautious about claiming that it would do all that embryo stem cells would be expected to do. At present the most likely case is that embryos stem cells would work for a wide range of diseases but that adult cells would only work for some conditions. Adult cells are also thought by some scientists to be riskier. Being older they could have developed defects. We have to face the possibility that if this route were pursued instead of the embryo route, it might be only able to treat certain types of cell degeneration disease and not some others.

At present, no one knows if these really would be true alternatives to stem cells derived from embryos. Recent discoveries suggest that adult and placental material is indeed much more "plastic" than had been thought even a year ago. This is certainly worthwhile pursuing this line of research, as the Catholic Church is advocating. But that is not the same as saying that they will necessarily be able to reproduce all cell types. While it is right to pursue research into adult stem cells and cell nuclear transfer with the aim of avoiding using of embryos, it is more sanguine about the realistic prospects.

Don't get Confused about Cloned Embryos

Another issue of confusion is that adult dervied stem cells are claimed to be an alternative to cloned embryos. This is a misleading use of the term "cloning". The main source of embryos for embryo stem cell research would be so-called "spares" left over from IVF treatment. The stem cells would be removed from such embryos and reprogrammed to produce the chosen type of cell. This has nothing to do with nuclear transfer cloning.

The cloning of embryos would only comes into it over the issue of tissue rejection. By definition, cells from spare IVF embryos would be of a different genetic type to the patient. In some cases they might be rejected by the patients immune system. One suggested solution is to use the Dolly nuclear transfer cloning method to produce a cloned embryo from the patient's own tissue, but instead of implanting it to become a cloned baby, it would be used only as a source of cells of the same genetically type as the patient. This would be legal, because UK law does not specifically disallow the production of cloned embryos.

Ethical Aspects

This is simply to clarify the scientific aspects. The ethical issues are discussed in more detail in other pages on this website. By way of information, however, the Church of Scotland's view of the embryo differs from that of the Roman Catholic church. The Church of Scotland affirms the special status of the embryo as created by God, not just a ball of cells; but it also recognises the potential benefits of embryo research under limited circumstances. In submissions to the Government concern has been expressed that to derive stem cells from embryos could effectively remove the sense of a special status of an embryo, from an entity deserving of respect, to a mere resource from which to take cells. It is argued that it would mark a watershed in the way we have use embryos. Hitherto research on embryos has mainly been limited to fertility issues, highly controversial, but still retaining the concept of the embryo as a whole entity. Treating the embryo as a source of replacement cells is to treat it as just a resource for spare parts. This is to be debated at the 2001 Church of Scotland General Assembly.

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