This is unbelievable–except it isn’t: A front page story in today’s SF Chronicle, headlined “Keeping Hope Alive,” purportedly concerns local young woman named Katie Sharify, who was the last patient to receive an injection (adult stem cells made from embryonic) in Geron’s now defunct ESCR human trial. But her poignant personal story is wrapped around a meme seeking to convince readers that ESCR remains the great hope for cures.
Of course, to do that, adult stem cell research can’t be mentioned. And you guessed it, not one of the very hopeful successful adult stem cell human trial successes–including with spinal cord injury-caused paralysis–is even mentioned. From the story (different title on-line):
Her recovery so far has been pockmarked with highs and lows – the devastation of realizing the extent of her injuries, the hope of a novel new therapy, the disappointment when the study she’d joined was discontinued. But as she returns to her family’s home in Pleasanton, Sharify said she carries with her a new and unexpected passion. “I used to be this shallow girl. I only cared about my hair and makeup and going to clubs,” said Sharify on Tuesday. “Now, for the first time ever, I feel really passionate about something. I have been given the power of being a spokesperson and advocating for stem cell research. “I want other people to learn about this research. And I want them to see someone like me, a 23-year-old who’s ready to go on with her life.”
Why do I get the sense that Sharify hasn’t been told the entire truth about the current state of stem cell research? Does she know that paralyzed human patients have had feeling restored with adult stem cells, which studies have been reported in peer reviewed journals? She sure won’t get it from reading the article, or perhaps, from the people who could tell her the truth:
The study’s cancellation was disappointing, but not entirely unexpected, said Dr. Stephen McKenna, chief of the rehabilitation trauma center at Santa Clara Valley Medical Center. It may still prove useful, he said. “We’ve demonstrated that human embryonic stem cells can be put in humans,” McKenna said. “Geron established a foothold. This study could be the lead-in for using stem cells for stroke, heart attacks, diabetes. There’s a whole corral of cellular therapy ready to go.”
Good grief! They are already going! Adult stem cells are succeeding in every one of the maladies mentioned by McKenna! But the reporter (and Sharify) probably wasn’t told that, as a consequence of which, the full story creates a fundamentally untrue context.
All three should have read a story published last year in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. From “Research From Adult Stem Cells Surpassing Embryonic Type:”
For all the emotional debate that began about a decade ago on allowing the use of embryonic stem cells, it’s adult stem cells that are in human testing today. An extensive review of stem cell projects and interviews with two dozen experts reveal a wide range of potential treatments. Adult stem cells are being studied in people who suffer from multiple sclerosis, heart attacks and diabetes. Early results suggest stem cells can help some patients avoid leg amputation. Recently, researchers reported that they restored vision to patients whose eyes had been damaged by chemicals.
Apart from these efforts, transplants of adult stem cells have become a standard lifesaving therapy for perhaps hundreds of thousands of people with leukemia, lymphoma and other blood diseases. “That’s really one of the great success stories of stem cell biology that gives us all hope,” said Dr. David Scadden of Harvard, who notes stem cells also are used to grow skin grafts. “If we can re-create that success in other tissues, what can we possibly imagine for other people?”
The Tribune-Review story is a welcome exception to the SF Chronicle’s general rule. As a consequence, people continue to be generally kept in the dark about the true state of the regenerative medical research. It’s a shameful withholding of true hope from suffering people and their families.
December 14th, 2011 | 1:50 pm
So what if adult stem cells have shown promise?
How else will we find out if embryonic stem cells might be better than adult stem cells (or worse)? Consult a deity? Turn to a soothsayer? Go with what our ‘guts tell us’?
We need to run the trials and do the research.
Thus, more ESC research is needed. To accomplish this, we need to remove the restrictions and let science go where the data and hypotheses take us.
Once we have far more evidence and data, we will know if ESCs are better or worse than adult stem cells, and then we can talk about it.
Otherwise, there is no valid point to the whole “adult stem cells are better” implied mantra and the tiresome ‘blame the media’ whine.
Wesley J. Smith Reply:
December 14th, 2011 at 3:57 pm
Actually, there is. First, we need honest reporting from media, not advocacy and bias masking as reporting. Second, people are being fed false goods and are being denied information that would provide legitimate and more immediate hope. Third, the hype was used to obtain a political result, as in Prop 71 and Measure 2, perhaps not otherwise obtained had the people been given accurate information by scientists and media. Funny, when ESCR seemed to promise the most hope, it was so reported. Now that it doesn’t so seem, it is still reported as if it does. That’s a corruption of science and journalism. Other than that, no big deal.
pauld Reply:
December 14th, 2011 at 4:35 pm
@Wesley J. Smith, Exactly right, Mr Smith. The evidence shows that embrionic stem cell research show little promise because of tissue rejection problems that have always been apparent and problems with tumors that keep recurring in empirical work. Adult stem cell research has not presented either of these problems and have actually generated successful results. These problems have thus far been intractable for embrionic stem cells and there no good ideas on the horizon to resolve them any time in the foreseeable future.
It is important also to recognize that embrionic research has never been banned in the U.S–the Bush policy was not to subsidize the research. Given limited goverment funds, it makes sense on purely pragmatic, scientific grounds to fund the research that is most promising.
Embrionic research makes sense only on political grounds as a wedge issue that attempts to increase the moral price of holding a principled pro-life position. This political strategy is successful only to the extent that accurate information is withheld from the general public.
David Reply:
December 15th, 2011 at 11:13 am
@Wesley J. Smith, none of that comes anywhere close to demonstrating that “adult stem cells are better”.
It is not possible to conclude with confidence that ultimately “adult stem cells [will be] better” than embryonic stem cells because we do not know enough about embryonic stem cells.
No such claim can be made with quality evidence and data – for, said data does not exist.
Who’s being “denied information”? That’s laughable. It’s the individual’s job to understand the research behind stem cells.
Get a library card. It’s not that difficult.
No corruption of science is present. Journalists can make up anything they want people to read. The results from scientists, however, are what they are; therefore, no corruption in science has been found.
holyterror Reply:
December 15th, 2011 at 12:19 am
@David, Seriously, David. Just imagine if the facts of important scientific work was being kept from the public in some deliberate move by people whose views you despise. Just imagine what you would say.
Geez, it’s about ethical dilemmas, too. You can believe that the embryo deserves no special ethical consideration, disagree with Wesley, without having to attack him when he points out a totally valid criticism of how the research is covered.
(I guess you would have been right on board with the Tuskeegee Syphilis Study, too, right? All in the name of science? It’s ok to keep knowledge from people as long as “science” is advancing?)
David Reply:
December 15th, 2011 at 11:20 am
@holyterror, what knowledge is being kept from people? Or, are you not being adequately spoon-fed? Too difficult for you to go out and do your own digging?
And you are wrong on the Tuskegee question. Informed consent for an experiment on a person is different from a newspaper article in a publication. Seriously. Think about it. Amazing and shocking, I know.
holyterror Reply:
December 15th, 2011 at 7:10 pm
@David, “Go out and do your own digging,” eh? We are talking about science reporting that deliberately does not tell the whole story.
**Why do you, a proponent of science, not care about this?**
And, of course informed consent is a specific application of what I am talking about. I mean:
Are all things justifiable in the name of science? Because, in the end, aren’t we talking about similar things: Experimentation on humans having ethical considerations that may or may not be mitigated by the possible outcomes.
Why do you keep avoiding that? You play it down or ignore the question. You are so obtuse as to seem deliberate when you say that it is only journalists who refuse to report and not scientists who continually obfuscate and conflate the issues. (Wesley has reported on this time and again.) You act as if profit is absolutely no part of the considerations of the parties involved. You use snide comments instead of reasonable arguments with proof.
You are so unbelievably disingenuous it is impossible to take your claims of rationalism seriously.
December 14th, 2011 | 1:55 pm
Hi Wesley,
I could write a book correcting you and showing you copious data in regards to the hurdles facing iPSC v hESC. The success your are referring to is coming from Autogulous Stem Cell trials used for oncology treatments. NOT one iPSC FDA approved trial is underway in the USA and it is at LEAST 10years away. However several autogulous cellular therapies are underway and boy they sure do look great. The problem is that they ARE VERY expensive, becuase each patient must have its own special cocktail so as to not cause an allergic reaction. Securing off the shelf therapies is what is needed and Mesoblast, ATHX are close, very close, IMO Mesoblast and ATHX will have off the shelf treatments for Myocardial infarction by 2015 in common use around the US. The most important thing to do is to leave the Ideology at the door. hESC (bad) iPSC (good).
Using iVF embryo’s is showing appreciation for life as would be donating a brain dead accident victoms heart or lungs etc.
Sai Rosen
http://www.investorstemcell.com
Wesley J. Smith Reply:
December 14th, 2011 at 8:57 pm
Sai: You are entitled to your opinion, but brain dead is dead. An embryo is alive before being destroyed. The better analog would be to diagnosed PVS, which would be killing for organs. And that is precisely what is bieng proposed. But then, once we start using human beings instrumentally, we should not be surprised that we take our ethics where the logic of our first principles lead. And we don’t leave ETHICS at the door. Without ethics and morality, we could become monsters.
holyterror Reply:
December 15th, 2011 at 12:22 am
@Sai Rosen, Click here to see an important money-making venture for your dollars! It’s just like kidney donation, see!
David Reply:
December 15th, 2011 at 11:15 am
@Sai Rosen, good luck. This is a data and evidence free zone. haha
December 14th, 2011 | 4:06 pm
[...] First Things [...]
December 14th, 2011 | 4:12 pm
It’s really shocking to realize that information is being kept from this girl and that she is being given a definitely false picture. That she is so being misled is, IMO, quite obvious. And when one thinks about it, that’s inexcusable. She is, after all, a patient and a human being. Perhaps she could get into one of the studies with adult stem cells and see some benefit. It really seems that we have come to the point where we have to admit that the ESCR-hypers cynically manipulate people like her and deliberately keep them in the dark for their own political purposes, which is truly wicked.
Wesley J. Smith Reply:
December 14th, 2011 at 4:32 pm
Same thing happened to Christopher Reeve.
December 14th, 2011 | 5:16 pm
[...] First Things [...]
December 14th, 2011 | 5:31 pm
@Same thing happened to Christopher Reeve.
It’s really shocking that you would use a comment like that to disparage the man’s memory…I mean really pathetic…you and someone in your family should have to fight his fight..(Delete)n cheap shot..but hey I see a spot for Catholicism on your blog…says it all!
Wesley J. Smith Reply:
December 14th, 2011 at 5:50 pm
Oh baloney. First, that wasn’t in any way a “shot” against Reeve. Second, this blog isn’t Catholic. Third, wash out your moouth with soap.
Kenneth Reply:
December 14th, 2011 at 10:10 pm
@Rich, the only cheap shot was your post, quite ignorant really.
December 14th, 2011 | 6:02 pm
“It’s really shocking that you would use a comment like that to disparage the man’s memory…”
Uh, Rich? While Reeve was campaigning for more research, the advances of adult stem cells were largely kept a secret from him, so that he could be a “better” advocate for ESCR. So, there: you’ve learned something today.
December 14th, 2011 | 6:03 pm
Can you tell me the citations for the studies in which paralyzed human patients have had feeling restored with adult stem cells? Most of the studies I’ve seen with adult stem cells are using rodents. Thanks.
Wesley J. Smith Reply:
December 14th, 2011 at 7:36 pm
Here’s just one. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1864811/
December 15th, 2011 | 1:19 am
Hi Wesley,
Adult stem cells now appear to show the best promise. It makes sense to run with those. Researching embryonic stem cells is like flogging a dead horse.
holyterror Reply:
December 15th, 2011 at 10:18 am
@Padraig Cronin, Some people could try to make the argument to continue experiments anyway, despite their repeated failures (albeit, I think, limited because of those failures, and not the government-funded billions of dollars that ESCR proto-scientists are clamoring for), BUT the question is also : SHOULD we do those studies?
The only reason we haven’t abandoned the idea of government sponsorship of ethically-problematic and continually-failing embryonic stem cell research is the dangling allure of the HUGE PAYOFF that could result from this kind of research, if it could be proven to work in any way that people want it to. And no, nobody wants to miss out on the paycheck.
David Reply:
December 15th, 2011 at 11:29 am
@holyterror, how are they “continually failing” if we have them in human clinical trials only ~12 years after their discovery? That is amazingly soon. Your claim is contradicted by reality.
holyterror Reply:
December 15th, 2011 at 7:18 pm
@David, I agree 12 years is not very long for any major breakthrough research such as ESCR wants to– and might even possibly be able to– be.
I do think that, due to the better success with adult stems cells combined with the nature of the failures thus far (tumor creation) make it something that, all other things being equal, would qualify it for a small scale if at all.
BUT that is in a universe where the absolutely problematic nature of the embryo doesn’t exist. In THIS universe, it does. You can’t get around the ethics of the thing.
And to be more specific, in relation to my reference to Tuskeegee above, you do not even have to believe that the embryo has equal status to a born human being to see the ethical problems in research on the embryo. The larger question is, At what point do we say no to certain types of research? If there is no justification for saying no to any research there is no basis for informed consent, as long as a larger good can be proven.
holyterror Reply:
December 15th, 2011 at 7:21 pm
@holyterror, Oh, also I did not read your comment correctly the first time. About human clinical trials, you have to be kidding me. The result of embryonic stem cell work is *only* in clinical trials based on two factors: the success of adult stem cells and the financial/profit motive driving the research. On their own they have proven to be dangerous enough to be slowed down and probably would have been if you remove even one of the two factors I list.
David Reply:
December 15th, 2011 at 11:26 am
@Padraig Cronin, definitely keep running with them. We’ve been running with them for decades. ESCs are quite new, but there are too many public restrictions on them to really advance their possibilities – or determine their uselessness. ESCs may or may not be better; and it will probably be case dependent.
The greatest use for ESCs may be as research tools and drug screening, rather than direct therapeutic agents – we need to keep that in mind, too. We just won’t know until we do more research over the coming decades.
Chris Reply:
December 15th, 2011 at 1:56 pm
@David,
About research tools, check out a Stanford study from this week than explains why using iPS cells is easier, since to study a rare disease for example, you have to find it in a human embryo and then kill him/her, rather than just collecting some skin cells from a patient.
December 15th, 2011 | 1:29 am
We should also note that there’s a conflation of stem cells and human embryonic stem cells in this story. This story makes it appear that all stem cell research is embryonic stem cell research, which it is not.
While maybe not the intended tact in this story, the conflation of embryonic stem cell research/embryonic stem cells and non embryonic stem cells/research in the past before Yamanaka and iPSCs killed the momentum of ESCR, was to make it appear that ESCR was succeeding and moving forward (with the alleged great promise of course) by conflating it with non ESCR treatments/results. Or course in addition to this ACT was doing science by press release and misreporting in their press release(s) what their study(s) said… as in the case of saying they created stem cell lines without killing embryos. ESCR advocates and their media and political accomplices also used this conflation to make it appear that opponents of ESCR/SCNT were opposed to all research. I remember having to put out press releases, briefings and etc to counter the bald faced lies that we opponents of ESCR is opposed to all stem cell research. Anyone implying, creating the impression, or saying we opponents are opposed to ALL stem cell research is a bald faced liar and manipulating others for political purposes. We support almost all stem cell research. We oppose that small part kills human embryos.
This article, though maybe not doing all that, nonetheless uses the words stem cells in a way that in makes it seem it refers only to hESCs. This means there must be the silly season in CA and that a ballot measure is on the way to separate Californians from more of their money.
December 15th, 2011 | 10:39 am
[...] Editor’s note. This appears on Wesley’s blog at http://www.firstthings.com/blogs/secondhandsmoke/2011/12/14/keeping-the-embryonic-stem-cell-hype-ali… [...]
December 15th, 2011 | 1:06 pm
[...] First Things [...]
December 15th, 2011 | 3:35 pm
I’ve got to hand “IT” to you good people for teaching me a little about science. I don’t want to seem too ignorant, lazy and/or maybe just not smart enough to have learned so much about little human so called creature cells who a parent ly matter a great deal to many around here.
Thank you Wesley for teaching me a lot about ESC and the likes but I must honestly admit that at this time I can’t even see what I’ve learned and as far as you learned people are concerned, I most likely know very little about “IT” but for what “IT” is worth I’m trying to learn more! :)
What warms my heart is that, if you good people are truly sincere and I’m sure you are, well all you good caring humans are certainly discouraging those few who would want to experiment on large human fetuses and you’ve made “IT” clear here in so many words that you need not be a upper “C” atholic to join either.
Long story short and for what “IT” is worth, I’m proud of you guys and if there is a GOD then, I’m sure he (atheist) low case would be gay, I mean glad to have been made in His Own Image.
Does that make any sense sinner vic? :)
Peace
December 17th, 2011 | 1:53 am
If anyone is following along, be assured that over the next few years it will be demonstrated that embryonic stem cells are more powerfully therapuetic and healing than adult stem cells.
They will have this function for the same reason that a 20 year old heals more quickly from physical stress than a 50 year old does. Youth is healthier than age and embryonic youth is miraculously vital.
The concerns expressed here about safety are polemical rather than scientific. Many diseases and conditions will be cured over the next decade using embryonic stem cells. Much human disease and suffering is going to be relieved.
Embryonic stem cells can and will be developed without the destruction of embryos. The single cell blastomere technique of Advanced Cell Technology leaves the embryo intact.
Even so, someday the power will be interrupted on the IVF freezers full of these embryos. Championing the integrity of perpetually frozen embryos over the health of our fellow human beings seems to privilege abstract concepts over people.
For conversation’s sake, I’ll assert that a more humanistic balance of values is more congruent with the example of Jesus Christ.
In any event, I don’t feel a need to persuade anybody of anything. As diseases and conditions that have afflicted humankind are cured by embryonic stem cell therapies, this controversy will disappear.
December 17th, 2011 | 12:57 pm
How very loyal of you to stick to your script in the face of everything, Mark. We also notice that you claim that your side is What Jesus Would Do. Gosh, just imagine if opponents of ESCR had said such a thing…
December 17th, 2011 | 10:23 pm
There’s a personal history that influenced my appeal to Jesus Christ.
Back in 1994 I was a young man and a new Catholic convert. I had several letters to the editor published in First Things in which I tried to answer Richard Neuhaus’ Christian misanthropy with my efforts to express Christian humanism.
And yes, in this conversation I would maintain that having the infertile become pregnant and having the blind regain their sight is more celebratory of human dignity and welfare than upholding the integrity of embryos in a freezer until the electricity runs out.
December 19th, 2011 | 12:59 pm
Something to ponder. For those with religious objections to the use of embryonic stem cells for therapeutic use. Why did GOD create emryonic stem cells? Why did GOD delay differentiation of embryonic stem cells for 14 days? Geron, the first entity to use embryonic stem cells, did not destroy one single brain cell, heart cell, liver cell or any other cell that makes up a human body. They used undifferentiated embryonic stem cells. Maybe GOD intends for us to view life begining at cell differentiation not at fertilization. Differentiation does not begin for about 14 days after fertilization. Until then, not ONE SINGLE brain cell, finger nail cell, hair cell, etc., has been created, just stem cells that are multiplying. After 14 days the embryonic cells begin to differentiate into all the cell types fond in the body.
December 21st, 2011 | 3:13 am
[...] Wesley J. Smith decries a San Francisco Chronicle article which hypes hope in embryonic stem cell research despite evidence to the contrary, ignoring the success of adult stem cell research. Smith states the general public is generally uninformed on the issue, which does a disservice to suffering people and their families. [...]
December 29th, 2011 | 3:45 pm
Much headway has been made with adult stem cells. Right off the bat they are better than embryonic because they don’t involve rejection issues when taken form the patient. Unfortunately the drug giants want to create concoctions that they can charge out the *** for, they dont want to promote a procedure using the patients own cells. Embryonic cells fit the profit model better and they are a love child of secular progressive causes. So you continue to have these whiny “woe is me” stories when dogs and horses have been getting successful treatments with adult stem cells since 2003.
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