Science and Ethics of Embryonic Stem Cell Research

▪ 2000

by Lori P. Knowles and Eric Parens

      At the end of 1998, almost simultaneously, one team of researchers announced that it had isolated human embryonic stem (ES) cells and another announced that it had isolated human embryonic germ (EG) cells. These announcements gave rise both to the promise of great medical benefits and to contentious ethical and policy questions. The medical promise of these cells is the potential to provide an endless supply of transplantable tissue. The ethical and policy questions primarily concern the embryonic and fetal sources of these cells. To understand both the promise and the ethical issues, it is important to understand some basic scientific facts about ES and EG cells.

      The announcement of the isolation of ES cells was made by James A. Thomson at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. Thomson and his colleagues isolated ES cells from “spare embryos”—that is, embryos created in a fertility clinic by in vitro fertilization that are no longer needed for transfer to a woman. These embryos, five to seven days old, are called blastocysts. The outer layer of the blastocyst is destined to become the placenta. The remainder of the blastocyst, called the inner cell mass, is destined to become the fetus. Embryonic stem cells are isolated from this inner cell mass.

      John Gearhart at Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Md., announced the isolation of EG cells. Gearhart and his colleagues isolated EG cells from five- to nine-week-old aborted fetuses. Such cells are referred to as embryonic germ cells because they come from a small set of stem cells that were set aside in the embryo and prevented from differentiating. They are referred to as embryonic germ cells because they were destined to give rise to the eggs or sperm of the next generation.

      ES and EG cells have two remarkable properties. First, the cells are in principle immortal. Whereas most cells divide a finite number of times and perish, ES and EG cells can be cultured to divide indefinitely, which makes them excellent objects for manipulation by researchers. Second, they are pluripotent; that is, they can turn into many—and perhaps all—cell types. All other cells have to some degree differentiated; that is, they have turned into one or another type of cell, such as nerve or muscle or skin. No one has yet successfully directed ES and EG cell differentiation to an extent that would be clinically useful, but the hope is that someday soon these cells will be used to generate specific, transplantable tissues.

      Despite the potential for medical benefit offered by ES and EG cells, the origin of these cells raises policy and ethical concerns. In the United States the policy issues primarily concern the use of federal funds for research involving human embryos and fetal tissue. The ethical concerns are primarily related to the moral status of the embryo and the aborted fetus.

      Human fetal tissue has been used in research aimed at developing therapies for disorders such as Parkinson's disease by transplanting that tissue into afflicted people. Before 1993, laws in the United States prohibited the use of federal funds for this research because the tissue used is obtained from aborted fetuses. In 1993 Pres. Bill Clinton lifted that ban. A number of restrictions exist to ensure that fetal tissue for research is obtained in a manner that respects the women from whom it is taken and that research does not encourage abortion. These restrictions are likely to apply to EG cell research.

      First, the physician is required to obtain the woman's informed consent to use fetal tissue removed from her body. Second, to ensure that the possibility of donating tissue to benefit medical science does not influence a woman's decision, the donation of fetal tissue can be discussed only following a decision to terminate the pregnancy. Finally, a woman may not direct that her fetal tissue be used to benefit a particular person.

      The policy situation with respect to human embryonic stem cells is more complicated. Currently, U.S. law prohibits federal funding of human embryo research. Consequently, private corporations have taken the lead and funded the research mentioned above that isolated the first human ES and EG cells. Lawyers for the U.S. National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, Md., have provided a legal opinion that states that under the current law it is legal to fund research on human ES cells so long as federal funds are not used to support the derivation of those cells. Although this legal interpretation may be technically sound, it places the U.S. government in the paradoxical position of withholding funds from research to derive ES cells but permitting funds for research on ES cells once they have been derived by means of private funds.

      The ethical problems associated with ES cells are largely connected to the question of the moral status of the embryo. How one evaluates the act of deriving ES cells depends on whether one believes the human embryo is a person, a mass of human cells, or something in between that requires special consideration. Science cannot answer this question. Currently, most Western countries permit embryo research for specific purposes and within certain strict limits. They proceed from the view that embryos have neither the moral status of persons nor that of mere cells; because of their special connection with the human community, they enjoy an intermediate position that requires that they be treated with special respect. The National Bioethics Advisory Commission (NBAC) has debated the ethics of ES and EG research and recommended a partial lifting of the embryo research ban so that research using surplus embryos can be eligible for federal funding.

      Many people argue that creating embryos for research does not recognize the special status of the human embryo. Some argue that there is no important moral difference between doing research on embryos originally created for reproduction and doing research on embryos specifically created for that purpose. NBAC decided, however, to recommend that funding be available only for research on surplus embryos.

      Finally, ES cell research implicates the cloning debate. Many countries have policies forbidding the use of cloning, or somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT), to create a human being (reproductive cloning). It is possible, however, to use SCNT to create embryos as a source of ES cells. A patient can donate a tissue, and by means of SCNT it is possible to create a source of ES cells with that patient's DNA. Consequently, this therapeutic cloning technique offers the potential to create tissues for transplantation that exactly match the recipient's tissues.

      ES and EG cell research offers the potential of great medical benefit, but it also raises difficult ethical issues and complicates policy development. This turbulent area of research will surely command our attention well into the next millennium.

Lori P. Knowles is Associate for Law and Bioethics and Erik Parens is Associate for Philosophical Studies at the Hastings Center, Garrison, N.Y.

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