SCIENTISTS SHOULD BE UP IN ARMS against "science advocates" who undermine the reputation of science by engaging in deception, obfuscation, spin, and hype to win the political debate over embryonic stem-cell and human cloning research. The latest such low blow comes from the Houston-based Alliance for Medical Research, a non-profit educational organization with informal ties to the Baylor College of Medicine, also in Houston, in its new video, "Regenerative Medicine: Pathway to Cures." The video, which claims to be "educational," is actually a 14-minute exercise in propaganda. It is a disgrace to the scientific community.

Within seconds of the video's opening, an announcer tells viewers:

Now with this revolutionary breakthrough of regenerative medicine doctors will actually be able to cure diseases, not just treat them with pills and shots. Insulin-producing cells will be injected into the diabetic child to cure diabetes. Retinal cells will be injected to make the blind see. Nerve cells will be used to make the quadriplegic walk again. Stem-cell research has the potential to cure over 130 million Americans plagued by chronic degenerative diseases and conditions. This is the potential that stem-cell research holds for us.

In reality, scientists do not know whether embryonic stem cells will ever "cure" anything. Indeed, it is possible that they will never be able to be used in human beings due to safety concerns--such as the potential for tumor formation and immune rejection. They might not work as hoped, or if they do, their most efficacious use might be to alleviate

Pathway to Cures goes downhill from there. Seeking to promote human cloning, the video describes somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT) as creating a "manufactured egg cell" that will provide "a unique opportunity to grow a patient's own cells for repairing or replacing his or her diseased cells."

This is balderdash. SCNT--which is a technique of asexual reproduction, a.k.a., cloning--actually creates a new embryo, not a "manufactured egg cell." As an article published in the December 27, 2000 Journal of the American Medical Association--written by several bioethicists and biologists who strongly support SCNT research--put it, "CRNT [cell replacement through nuclear transfer] requires the deliberate creation and disaggregation of a human embryo." Thus, just as Dolly the cloned sheep began her biological existence as a cloned sheep embryo, assuming that human cloning can ever be done, the result of the process would be the creation of a nascent human organism--not an egg.

The video also describes "therapeutic cloning" in the present tense--as if it can already be done in humans:

This manufactured egg cell containing the Patient's DNA is stimulated to divide for about 5 days to produce stem cells, which contain only the patient's DNA. [False: It also contains mitochondrial DNA from the egg, but never mind that.] Scientists add cell proteins and growth factors to these stem cells to coax them into becoming the type of cells needed to cure the patient without the complication of rejection, because these cells contain the patient's DNA. These stem cells are then transferred into the patient to repair or replace the damaged cells and they are not rejected.