The Pro-Life movement is ever evolving to address the current attacks on innocent human life. We now help others recognize the dignity of human life assaulted under the guise of medical research, as in embryonic stem cell research and human cloning. Our fight against abortion continues, but the unborn are the safest they have been in 30 years in Texas due to the passage of Pro-Life legislation. While continuing to work for total protection for the unborn, we face a more intense battle with the biotech industry. We must continue to press forward, noting the work still to be accomplished, while also being comforted by the progress that has been made.
Please read this issue of the Pro-Life Update carefully to understand some of the challenges we now face and how you--an educated Pro-Lifer--can help advance the Culture of Life. Please share this information with your family, friends and church congregations. Make copies. Spread the news.
108th U.S. Congress Most Successful since Roe v. Wade
The 108th U.S. Congress is almost over and has been the most successful Pro-Life session since Roe v. Wade in 1973. This Congress is the first one since 1973 in which the President and the leadership in both the House of Representatives and the Senate have all been Pro-Life. Several bills supported by Texas Right to Life and National Right to Life have been put into law, while all anti-life legislation has been defeated.
The U.S. Congress passed and President Bush signed into law the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act, the Unborn Victims of Violence, and a ban on the patenting of human embryos.
The Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act was sponsored by Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) and Congressman Steve Chabot (R-OH). The ban passed both the Senate and the House by a two-to-one margin and was signed into law by President Bush on November 5, 2003. This ban is the first on any type of abortion since Roe v. Wade. Currently, President Bush and his administration are defending this ban against legal challenges.
The Unborn Victims of Violence Act, sponsored by Senator Mike DeWine (R-OH) and Congresswoman Melissa Hart (R-PA), recognizes unborn children as crime victims when they are injured or killed during the commission of violent federal crimes. This bill passed the House in both 1999 and 2001 but only passed the Senate this year. President Bush signed this bill on April 1, 2004.
Congressman Dave Weldon (R-FL) won House approval of an amendment to prohibit the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office from issuing any patent on a human embryo. The biotechnology industry hopes to clone human embryos and then kill them by extracting their stem cells. Some biotech firms hope eventually to obtain patents that would allow an exclusive property right to create and sell copies of cloned or genetically modified human embryos (much as animals with specific genetic traits are now patented and sold for laboratory research).
This legislative session is proof that electing Pro-Life leaders and remaining involved in the political process noticeably affects the Culture of Life in our country. Please continue to support Pro-Life candidates and Pro-Life legislation on both the state and federal levels. Fat Stem Cells Show Promise for Heart Bypass Patients
Scientists at the International Fat Applied Technology Society have found another use for adult stem cells in fat stem cells. Stem cells derived from fat may be able to provide a non-surgical alternative to heart bypass operations for people with narrowed coronary arteries. These stem cells could also potentially treat peripheral artery disease in the legs and repair congenital bone deformities or injuries.
The most exciting discovery is that stem cells from fat (now called “adipose stem cells” or ASCs) appear to encourage the growth of new blood vessels. Thus, scientists hope that they will be able to help the heart grow new vessels to bypass narrowed or blocked coronary arteries leading to the heart. Scientists already have evidence that these cells can become bone, cartilage, skeletal muscle, and even “like a heart cell.” They have even been able to beat like heart cells in cell cultures.
Scientists Hope to Clone Humans
The same scientists who cloned Dolly the sheep are now applying for a license to clone human embryos. They intend to study cures for motor neuron disease (MND). Research cloning (also called therapeutic cloning) has been legal in the UK since 2001. Scientists at the University of Newcastle were granted permission to perform research cloning with human embryos this past August.
Professor Ian Wilmut and his team at Edinburgh’s Roslin Institute hope to clone cells from patients with MND to study how the illness develops in embryos. He claims that his team has no intention of producing cloned babies; he has said that the “diseased embryos” would be destroyed after experimentation (approximately six days, or the blastocyst stage). “I would emphasize that, at this time, our objective is to understand the disease. Knowledge often does have two edges.” The edge he speaks of, of course, is killing an embryonic human for its stem cells.
Pro-Life advocates in the UK are extremely concerned. According to Life, a nonprofit Pro-Life group in the UK, “We hope scientists will be able to discover treatments for all kind of conditions including motor neuron disease, but not through the deliberate manufacture and destruction of human embryos.”
The Pro-Life movement still has much work to ensure that all people throughout the world are welcomed into Life and respected.
