An end to procrastination?
Nature 411, 117 (2001) © Macmillan Publishers Ltd. |
A new German bioethics council should lead to a prompt resolution of debates over stem cells.
Germany's main
grant-giving agency, the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG), is proposing a
much-needed relaxation of the country's restrictive embryo protection law, which
bans the cultivation of human stem-cell lines from embryo cells. In doing so, it
crosses swords with a hostile government whose position on the sanctity of
embryonic cells appears unshakeable (see page
119).
Coincidentally,
Chancellor Gerhard Schröder has created a national ethics council to advise the
government on bioethics (see page
124). Stem-cell research will be its baptism of fire, and could be a
precedent for how Germany handles future ethical dilemmas in basic research.
The DFG has
not rushed its thinking on human embryonic stem-cell research. It has taken due
time to consider the issue thoroughly, and has reached fair and balanced
conclusions. Its suggestion that, in well-justified cases and with appropriate
checks and controls, researchers should be allowed to import and even to
cultivate human embryonic stem-cell lines is a reasonable response to recent
scientific advances. These advances increasingly indicate the medical potential
of stem cells to replace diseased tissues and organs.
It is true, of
course, that the DFG's position is driven by the interests of the scientific
community. But this does not mean that such interests are inevitably different
from those of society, which will probably not want to miss out on any medical
benefits that might arise.
Appropriately
and inevitably, German citizens want any move towards the use of humans —
including the helpless embryo — for research purposes to be discussed in
depth. Soul-searching debate on embryonic stem-cell research has filled
newspapers and spawned a stream of bioethical conferences over the past two
years. The DFG has held back from endorsing the research, arguing for its
restriction to adult stem cells until the weight of scientific information
justified crossing a new boundary — as it now believes is the case.
But when does
society's wider debate end? The government's demand for it to continue smacks of
fear of taking a tough decision the year before a general election. Hopefully,
the new national ethics council will not feel the need to start from scratch, or
unduly delay reporting its conclusions. As Germany learnt to its cost in gene
sequencing, late entry to a fast-moving research field leaves the research
community and others at a significant disadvantage.
Category: 4. Ethical and Social Concerns Arising out of Biotechnology, 31. Stem Cells