A new report issued by the Center for Genetics and Society has been released titled, “Responsible Federal Oversight of New Human Biotechnologies: Opportunities for the New Administration”. The document, found here is a policy brief that clearly outlines the ways in which the new Obama administration can RIGHT NOW lift restrictions on funding for embryonic stem cell research, ensure comprehensive oversight of that research, and outlaw reproductive human cloning.
Going further, the report outlines the ways in which the Obama administration can promote a discourse that allows for a discussion that promotes a biotechnology friendly nation that is pro-science and technology and eventually leads to a nation that has oversight over assisted reproductive technologies (a little too late for that), better oversight of human subjects research, more consumer projections, and better international cooperation.
While any of this would seem hard to object to, it’s loftiness and over-promising is precisely where President Obama is likely too to fail–if they expect it all to happen RIGHT NOW. If the report had stopped at the first there points, it would have had me at hello and singing AMEN. The first three are objectives that are achievable–in the first four years. The rest of the report is a generational shift of a magnitude that to put on President Obama’s shoulders is simply setting this administration up for failure. It isn’t a practical road map–it’s idealism for sure. They are great aspirations–and one’s that I agree with for sure. Most liberals would. But to ask this administration to go that far, isn’t reasonable–not when there isn’t even an HHS secretary confirmed yet.
So, I commend CGS for their recommendations. They are a strong set of recommendations for how policy should be reshaped over the next 8-10 years. Maybe they will prove me wrong and show that I am too cautious and expect too little out of the administration. What can happen right now with stem cell funding and regulations will likely come to pass. But as for the rest of the report, beyond embryonic stem cell research funding and regulation, those agenda items will happen are likely to happen after the first four years of the Obama administration.
Summer Johnson, PhD