NIH Draft Guidelines For Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research Funding

As you may have heard, President Obama overturned the restrictive Bush-era “policy” - which was really an effective ban - on Federal funding for research on human embryonic stem cells. Yesterday, the National Institutes of Health posted on their web site the list of draft guidelines that they plan to put in place to restrict the use of Federal funds for research on embryonic stem cells.

The guidelines allow Federal funds to be used only on stem cells that come from embryos created for reproductive purposes - and which (though this is not explicitly stated in the guidelines) would otherwise be thrown away. As well, the cells must be donated by the people for whom the embryos were created, and consent must be given at two separate points during the process. The guidelines further stipulate that certain research may not be funded with Federal dollars, even if the cells to be used in the research would otherwise be eligible for Federal funding.

And would you believe - as a hard-core liberal who backs science wholeheartedly - that I think these guidelines are entirely appropriate? It opens up a theoretically endless supply of new stem cells - you don’t imagine that barren women or guys firing blanks are going to stop having fertility treatments, do you? - and eliminates literally every objection that the religious right might have voiced in order to continue to obstruct this important scientific work.

Could the system theoretically be corrupted? Sure it could. After all, it’s being run by Americans with access to government money. Hell, in the current climate you would almost expect for it to be corrupted - but scientists are held to a higher standard than, say, bankers and other greedy scumbags. (They also do more important work, and they do it better, but whatever.) With apologies to Frank Zappa, they’re not in it for the money.

With that said, it is my sincere hope that everyone in the world (not named Palin) will visit the NIH website a week from now (see, especially, the page dedicated to stem cell information) and submit comments in support of these guidelines that will (finally) allow this very important work to begin progressing. According the information posted by the NIH yesterday, a URL will be set up for public comment once the guidelines have been published in the Federal Register, which they expect to happen by the end of next week.