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7th
January, 2005
STEVE
FIELDING
Just three years after the Australian Parliament passed
legislation banning cloning human embryos, a new report has
called for the cloning of human embryos for research.
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WHERE
TO FOR THE HUMAN RACE?: Senator Steve Fielding argues
that cloning human embyros crosses a "major ethical
line". PICTURE: Yarik Mission (www.sxc.hu)
"Proponents
of cloning have presented the choice before us as
one between cloning and curing disease," says
Senator Steve Fielding.
"I
don't accept that."
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The
fact that nothing has changed since the idea of cloning was
rejected three years ago counts for nothing.
Nor does the fact that research from Swinburne University
revealed that 63 per cent of "...the Australian public
do not feel comfortable with scientists cloning human embryos
for research purposes".
The Lockhart Committee was established to review Australia's
laws on embryo research and cloning. It produced the report
it was expected to produce. It was a committee set up to satisfy
state governments with high hopes of securing millions of
dollars of biotechnology research money for their states.
Cloning human embryos crosses a major ethical line, because
for the first time we would be deliberately creating a human
being with the intention of destroying the embryo for research.
It would be treating a human as a means to an end, rather
than recognising that human beings are ends in themselves.
Proponents of cloning have presented the choice before us
as one between cloning and curing disease. I don't accept
that.
During parliamentary debate in 2002 there was strong pressure
for human embryo research on the basis of promised cures.
But three years later less than ten per cent of all the embryos
licensed to be destroyed for research were used in efforts
to find cures. What’s more, no cures have been found
using embryonic stem cells.
Science gives us the power to do good things and bad. Science
can exercise power over others, so it is important for Parliament
to determine the ethical boundaries under which it operates.
It is understandable that some scientists working in this
area want to do research without the hassle of restrictions.
But the interests of people doing research are not always
the interests of the subjects of the research or the Australian
people.
Using adult stem cells such as stem cells from umbilical cord
blood is ethically acceptable. Adult stem cells also have
a better track record in producing cures than embryonic stem
cell research.
For
example, last year German scientists reported improving patients'
heart function after a heart attack by using bone marrow stem
cells. Also in 2004, Portuguese researchers used nasal stem
cells to improve the motor function of patients with spinal
cord injury and South Korean researchers used stem cells from
umbilical cord blood to improve the function of a patient
with an injured spinal cord, so she could walk again.
In Australia, Griffith University's Professor Alan Mackay-Sim
has used adult nasal stem cells to treat Parkinson's disease
in rats.
According to the Lockhart Committee, cloning human embryos
for research purposes is OK because no one intends them to
be born, but creating embryos for reproductive purposes is
unethical.
"Three
years ago the Parliament rejected cloning human embryos
and the Committee has not made a case as to why the
ethical situation has changed. Family First continues
to oppose human cloning either for research or for
reproductive purposes."
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How
long will it be before some of the very same people who put
this argument turn around and say that if it is all right
to clone human embryos to be destroyed, how can anybody object
to cloning embryos so they can be implanted in a woman and
brought to birth?
It is ironic that it is often the same scientists who tell
us that reproductive cloning - cloning leading to the birth
of a baby - is unethical because it is not safe, who claim
that the results of research on cloned human embryos will
be successful.
It was only in March that Australia signed up to the United
Nations Declaration on Human Cloning, which prohibits all
forms of human cloning.
The Lockhart Committee's proposal is radical. Cloning does
not have community support. Three years ago the Parliament
rejected cloning human embryos and the Committee has not made
a case as to why the ethical situation has changed. Family
First continues to oppose human cloning either for research
or for reproductive purposes.
Steve Fielding is Family First senator for Victoria.
This article was first published in the Melbourne 'Herald
Sun' newspaper.
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