Posted on 09/20/2006 3:16:24 PM PDT by reaganson77
So far, all they have done with embryonic stem cells is generate tumors....cancerous tumors that is.
Welcome to FR. Enjoy your stay however brief it may be.
Maybe more money will solve that problem.
I thought I read that too and that it saved his life.
Poor conservatives, if we only had a heart. /s
That would be fine if the libs only had a brain.
Old media always fails to distinguish between fetal and other types of stem cells. But now they do find the distinction. Only it serves their purpose of lying and claiming embryonic stem cells offer more hope.
The blatant mind games and lies betray that MSM thinks its customers, those dumb enough to pay them attention, are fools. They despise their own adherents.
Actually embryonic stem cell research is over 20 years old.
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=44381
But, of course, that's not really the point. It is wrong to destory one life for the benefit of another.
The first stem cells were isolated in 1998.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/28/AR2005072800843.html
from the article "..lift political limits on using cells from embryos,.."
It's not against the law, but the Frankenstein scientists want to use OUR TAX DOLLARS, because venture capitalists are investing in ADULT stem cell research, because it WORKS!
Also, Embryonic stem cell research SHOULD be against the law.
The RESEARCH for ESC is over 20 years old - that's decades.
8 years old.
November 1998 that is.
You noticed that, too?
I haven't heard a single respectable researcher claiming one or the other is clearly the most promising. Nor have I heard researchers who are doing advanced work with adult stem cells claiming that there's no need to do research with embryonic stem cells. Every serious researcher grasps the fact that research on both is needed in order to determine what differences there may be in their capabilities. There's no shortage of politically/religiously-motivated cranks claiming that they KNOW embryonic stem cells are absolutely useless and that adult stem cells are going to provide a laundry list of miraculous new treatments -- they're just conspicuously absent from institutions that are actually DOing cutting edge research with adult stem cells.
Most likely they'll both end up being useful, but better at different things. And it's also likely that the potential of adult stem cells will only be fully realized with knowledge gained from embryonic stem cell research. To get an adult stem cell to turn into anything that happens to be needed for a particular patient will almost certainly involve first converting it into the functional equivalent of an embryonic stem cell. That hasn't been done yet, but 1) it's likely to happen sooner if research on embryonic stem cells is going on simultaneously, shedding light on precisely what the differences are, and how they convert in the other direction and 2) the potential of adult stem cells which have been converted to embryonic-equivalent stem cells will be realized much faster if researchers have already figured out how to make embryonic stem cells do many of the things that the converted adult cells will need to be coaxed to do.
The groups suing WARF and Thomson over the patents on stem cells are spreading the news:
http://www.signonsandiego.com/uniontrib/20060719/news_1b19patent.html
The consumer groups contend the patents should never have been issued because Thompson was not patenting something unique. They point to a patent issued in November 1992 and scientific articles published even earlier detailing how to derive embryonic stem cells from mouse embryos.
Thompson concedes in his patent application that a previously published recipe for deriving embryonic stem cells from mice works on human embryos, the groups said in their filing with the patent office.
Neither the earlier patent nor the articles were reviewed by the office when it considered whether to grant Thompson his patent, the groups said.
“WARF was not the first to do human embryonic stem cell research,” said Dan Ravicher, of the Public Patent Foundation. “They were just the first to run to the patent office and try to get such a broad patent.”
The nonprofit Public Patent Foundation, made up of patent lawyers and scientists, will handle all the legal wrangling for the requested re-examination, Ravicher said.
At the time Thompson's first patent request was filed, “it was obvious to one of ordinary skill in the art of embryonic stem cell derivation that the process taught by (the earlier patent and published articles) could be used to isolate embryonic stem cells of other mammals, including humans,” said Burnham Institute researcher Jeanne Loring, who filed a declaration to support the re-exam request.
And have been since 2002, or is it the mid 90's?:
http://www.sddt.com/reports/2002/07/intellectualproperty/tb.cfm
The roots of the conflict between WARF and Geron can be traced to the mid-1990s, when the federal government decided not to fund embryonic stem cell research. It was during that time period that University of Wisconsin researcher Dr. James A. Thomson was in need of additional funds to continue his stem cell research studies that eventually resulted in the breakthrough in stem cell isolation.
Of course, Geron and WARF have an agreement, now.
Any scientists who want to fart around with any embryonic stem cells can pay for it themselves. Don't have the money? Tough noogies.
http://www.forbes.com/forbeslife/health/feeds/hscout/2006/09/20/hscout535032.html
This is a bit of a different viewpoint.
reagonson77, let me know if this info from hocndoc's last link makes you happy:
"Therapy Benefits Heart-Attack Patients
09.20.06, 12:00 AM ET
WEDNESDAY, Sept. 20 (HealthDay News) -- Two German trials that used injected stem cells to strengthen the heart muscle after a heart attack got good results, while a small Norwegian trial showed no benefit.
All three trials used stem cells derived from bone marrow. Perhaps the best results came from the largest trial, done at the University of Frankfurt, which enlisted 204 patients, half of whom had stem cells injected three to seven days after a heart attack. Four months later, the injection fraction -- a measure of the heart's ability to pump blood -- was significantly better in patients who got the stem cells.
The injection fraction of the stem-cell recipients improved by 5.5 percent, compared to 3 percent for those who got conventional treatment, according to the report in the Sept. 21 New England Journal of Medicine.
After a year, the stem-cell recipients had a significantly lower incidence of second heart attacks. Their death rate was lower and fewer of them needed treatment to reopen blocked blood vessels.
A smaller trial, including 75 patients, by German researchers had some receiving either stem cells or injections of a molecule that stimulates stem-cell growth. The treatment produced moderate but significant improvement in the ejection fraction after three months, the researchers reported."
excerpt
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.