Posted on 03/12/2016 7:15:44 PM PST by kathsua
If this human breakthrough had occurred with embryonic stem cells, the front page stories would have screamed around the world.
But it was adult stem cells and so the reporting was muted. You see, the media still–after all these years–tend to judge the newsworthiness of a story based on whether a breakthrough is embryonic.
The story is sensational, nonetheless. Adult stem cells have cured blindness and may provide a splendid treatment for cataracts. From the Telegraph story:
Cataracts can be cured by using a patient’s own stem cells to regrow a ‘living lens’ in their eye, restoring sight in just three months, scientists have shown. In research described as ‘remarkable,’ surgeons reversed blindness in 12 infants born with congenital cataracts by removing the damaged lens and coaxing nearby cells to repair the damage.
This is great news. And the potential is really exciting:
“An ultimate goal of stem cell research is to turn on the regenerative potential of one’s own stem cells for tissue and organ repair and disease therapy,” said Dr Kang Zhang, chief of Ophthalmic Genetics and founding director of the Institute for Genomic Medicine at UC San Diego School of Medicine.
“The success of this work represents a new approach in how new human tissue or organ can be regenerated and human disease can be treated, and may have a broad impact on regenerative therapies by harnessing the regenerative power of our own body.
My, how times change. Ten years ago, that was the very kind assertion that led many in media, politics, and Big Biotech to brand embryonic stem cell opponents “anti-science” for predicting that with adult stem cells, this very scenario would occur.
LifeNews.com Note: Wesley J. Smith, J.D., is a special consultant to the Center for Bioethics and Culture and a bioethics attorney who blogs at Human Exeptionalism.
But not fetal cells, now interesting.
Also enhances the circulatory system....been around now for 15 yrs.....or so....
Excellent. Now the dim’s can grow a brain.
What good is it if it doesn’t devalue human life?
With dims and the GOPe the problem is curing evil.
This result is not surprising.
A characteristic of fetal cells is that they are primed to grow. That’s fine when they form a part of a fetal body, which also controls that growth very carefully. But when the cells are removed from the fetal body, those growth controls no longer exist. Tumors then form.
Adult stem cells are not primed for rapid growth the way fetal cells are. Plus, they are already on the path to become a specific cell type—meaning that not much has to be done in order to get them to settle into their new tissue.
The major reason for promoting fetal stem cells is to try to bring respectability to abortion. And why not—every other attempt to make abortion respectable has failed. If the pro-aborts keep throwing mud at that wall, it’s got to stick some time.
The entire reason for embryonic stem cell research is to establish the principle that some human beings can be killed or vivisected to benefit other approved human beings and to further establish the principle that all human beings are no more than useful parts and are utterly interchangeable.
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I don’t know - those docs who pick up a thousand bucks or so for an hour’s work doing cataract surgery might not be so supportive....
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