When the White House was confronted with the biological fact that none of its sixty plus stem cell lines (there are really no more than 25) will ever be useful for clinical research the Press Secretary basically argued ‘screw the facts, these lines will work because our President says they must’.
“This is an issue that has been previously raised and discussed. We’ve known from the very beginning that the lines that were authorized for research had this particular trait*and the scientists at NIH are very well aware of it and remain confident that the stem cell lines that are available will provide us with the adequate supply to do the most basic research.” The NIH had asked the FDA to specifically look at the issue and the FDA concluded that the same issue is presented by human feeder cells. “There is still much uncertainty about the promise of stem cell research. We are only at the stage of the beginning of basic research to understand the promise of embryonic stem cell research.”
Okee Dokey.
– Art Caplan