Biotech Company Claims First Cloned Human Embryo On November 25, 2001, the Associated Press reported that Advanced Cell Technology (ACT) of Worcester, MA had cloned the first human embryo, a development it said was aimed at obtaining embryonic stem cells for use in research. “These are exciting preliminary results,” said Robert P. Lanza, one of the researchers at ACT. “This work sets the stage for human therapeutic cloning as a potentially limitless source of immune-compatible cells for tissue engineering and transplantation medicine.” In findings published in Scientific American, ACT scientists said they had grown a six-cell human embryo. They said they created the early embryo by injecting a cell with its genetic material into a woman’s donated egg. However, the news from ACT drew swift protests from Pro-Life leaders who saw it as a step toward cloning human beings. “The distinction between reproductive and therapeutic cloning is utterly meaningless and intended to confuse the American people. Cloning results in the creation of an embryo, a new human being. This is a scientific, biological fact,” said Kenneth Connor, president of the Family Research Council. The U.S. House of Repre-sentatives has already passed legislation that would ban both reproductive cloning (creating babies that are genetic duplicates of adults) and so-called therapeutic cloning (creating unborn children to be killed for research). Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, D-SD, has delayed consideration of this legislation in the U.S. Senate. He has stated that he favors therapeutic cloning. On December 21, 2001, the Department of Health and Human Services indicated they will investigate why ACT got Federal funding, according to Rep. Joe Pitts (R-PA), a leading Congressional opponent of human cloning. A month prior ACT’s 11/25/01 announcement, Pitts indicated, the company had received grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), courtesy of American taxpayers. According to a December 20th letter Pitts received from HHS Secretary Tommy Thompson, the secretary has “asked the National Institutes of Health to inform me whether ACT had received any Federal grants which might have been involved in this human cloning research.” “As you know, the Bush Administration is opposed to any activities intended to clone a human being,” Thompson wrote. HHS “supports the proposed Human Cloning Prohibition Act of 2001, H.R. 2505, which would make it unlawful for any person knowingly to clone or attempt to clone a human being.” “There is an overwhelming consensus in this country that cloning human beings is wrong,” said Pitts. “Federal money should not be supporting unethical science, directly or indirectly.” According to a January 23, 2002 story on the NewScientist.com web site, Catherine Verfaillie, a researcher at the University of Minnesota, has discovered what is being called the “ultimate stem cell.” Found in adult bone marrow, it has passed every test proving that it can form every single tissue in the body and can be grown in culture indefinitely, with no signs of aging. If this research is confirmed, it offers extraordinary promise both to researchers pursuing cures and to patients in need of medical treatments. It offers a way to pursue needed research while eliminating any justification for unethical human embryo research by making embryonic stem cell research and “therapeutic” cloning obsolete.
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