CGS-authored

Many people focused on only one word in the banner headlines over news that Korean scientists have successfully cloned 11 embryos and created stem cell lines: cures. Spouses and parents of patients with diabetes, Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and spinal cord damage must have felt elated that their loved ones will no longer have to suffer.


Scientists felt elated, too. The American co-author of the stunning paper in the journal Science, Gerald Schatten, of the University of Pittsburgh, burbled that "in theory, this work could prove to be more significant than the discovery of vaccine or antibiotic".[1] Even his scientific rivals stumbled over each other to congratulate the ingenuity, thoroughness and speed at which Woo-Suk Hwang and his team had worked.



The problem is that the sick and the scientists are rejoicing over two different visions of the future. One believes that cloning embryos will soon yield life-saving cures for devastating diseases and injuries. The other knows that this kind of cloning is basically a research tool for the foreseeable future.



In a number of countries, this news is sure to give...