Human Embryos Created To Supply Researchers

Benefits May Be Huge, But Ethicists Troubled

Sharon Kirkey

The Ottawa Citizen

SAN DIEGO -- U.S. scientists have created human embryos for the sole purpose of research, a controversial move critics say will lead to researchers creating embryos just to later destroy them.

Researchers from the Jones Institute for Reproductive Medicine in Virginia used eggs and sperm donated from young, healthy donors to create 40 embryos. The researchers then retrieved human embryonic stem cells -- cells that are capable of growing into virtually any cell, tissue or organ in the human body.

Their work was revealed yesterday at the largest gathering ever of international experts in reproductive medicine. It is believed to be the first published study in the U.S. of scientists creating embryos outside the human body for the sole purpose of harvesting stem cells.

Scientists believe stem cells could lead to groundbreaking treatments for diseases such as Parkinson's and new organs and tissues for transplant patients.

But the research is controversial because the cells have to be harvested from human embryos and critics worry it will open the door to human cloning.

Two months ago, U.S. President Bill Clinton unveiled new guidelines allowing scientists to conduct federally funded research on human embryonic stem cells, but only if they use spare embryos left over from in-vitro fertilization attempts for couples undergoing assisted reproduction that normally would have been discarded anyway. However, the rules will not apply to privately funded research.

But scientists around the world are now saying they can no longer rely just on leftover embryos because of the speed at which stem cell research is moving. In addition, fertility clinics are moving toward limiting the number of embryos they create during each attempt at IVF because of growing concerns about multiple pregnancies.

Stem cells are retrieved when embryos are only microscopic clusters of cells -- three or four days old. Proponents of stem cell research argue the embryos never actually implant in a uterus or womb, so are not capable of surviving on their own.

There are no Canadian laws dealing with issues of embryonic research. In 1997 the Liberals allowed Bill C47, which would have included restrictions on embryo research, to die on the order paper. Canada has only a voluntary moratorium in place, though it doesn't cover research on human embryos.

Britain allows scientists to create embryos for research, but a spokesman for the country's Human Fertilization and Embryology Authority said yesterday that most researchers rely on donated embryos from IVF patients because of a severe shortage of donor eggs. He was aware of only one research project that's attempting to retrieve stem cells from embryos created with donor eggs and sperm.

Ethicists say creating embryos just for research raises huge social and ethical questions about respect for the transmission of human life.

"To transmit human life for no purpose other than its intentional destruction, we have to ask, 'Are we ethically justified in doing that?' " said Margaret Somerville, of McGill University's Centre for Medicine, Ethics and Law.

She said scientists have felt better about using spare embryos that would normally be destroyed anyway "because their moral intuition was so worrying." She said actually creating embryos for research and then destroying them "is a failure to show respect for human life."

"And the question comes up: What is the ethical number of embryos to create?"

The Virginia researchers said they created embryos using donor eggs and donor sperm for two reasons: To get research material from young, healthy, consenting donors and to use embryos that were never created with the intention of a pregnancy.

They retrieved 162 mature eggs from 12 young women.

The eggs were then fertilized with frozen sperm. Sixty-eight per cent fertilized, and half of those developed into a blastocyst, a five-day old embryo. From 40 embryos, the researchers were able to retrieve three stem cell lines.

The researchers said many ethical issues were considered before the study, which first had to be approved by the East Virginia Medical School's Institutional Review Board.

They also said both the egg and sperm donors fully understood the nature and purpose of the research before they agreed to participate.

Copyright © 2000 Ottawa Citizen.

This article posted November 4, 2000.