Sarah Rothman | Regulatory agency should oversee stem cells

I don't know about you, but Michael J. Fox's advertisement pleading for stem-cell research really got to me.

Vividly displaying the tremors of Parkinson's Disease, Fox appealed to the public to vote for candidates who support embryonic stem-cell research. He believes that federal restrictions on such research are holding up major breakthroughs that would help patients like him. It didn't take long before Rush Limbaugh claimed that Fox was either off his medicine or acting. And politicians such as, Tom Kean, the Republican New Jersey Senate candidate, went into damage-control mode saying they don't agree with Limbaugh. The partisan snowball grew.

The ad got me to be because I feel for Fox's situation. I grew up with Family Ties; I'm sad to see what the disease has done to him; and I support his efforts to endorse science. However, he is not in fact, an actual scientist. And neither is Rush Limbaugh. And neither is George W. Bush. The science has been fully polluted by the politics. Politicians are seeking scientists, or even celebrities, that will say what they want to hear, and scientists are willfully entering the political arena.

No one is doing his own job properly.

It's time for someone to regulate at the federal level. No, I don't mean "restrict." I'm aware we're already doing that. I mean "regulate," and I'm not talking about George W. Bush regulating things. I'm talking about creating an independent federal commission to support and regulate reproductive technology.

Decisions should be made by carefully chosen panels of experts, including research scientists, lawyers, social scientists, clinicians and patient-advocacy group representatives.

This isn't the first time Americans have disagreed about the potential of new scientific breakthroughs. In 1945, we were immensely frightened as a country by our own technological progress as we watched the aftermath of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Our country was faced with difficult ethical questions about the limits of nuclear power.

Human embryonic stem-cell research is also scary.

It opens a host of frightening questions that we, as humans, simply cannot answer. It may likely take some time to delineate reasonable boundaries for reproductive technology. But the trick is to promote the new technology while also safeguarding against abuses and probing public opinion. If you think this sounds too difficult, consider our history of regulating atomic energy.

Originally, nuclear power was regulated by the Atomic Energy Act of 1946. The act prohibited the commercial use of nuclear power and established the Atomic Energy Commission. But over time, the science developed and industry got excited. So in 1954, the act was amended so that the commercial development of nuclear power was made possible.

The dual purpose of the AEC was to promote nuclear energy while also regulating its safety. Critics charged that under the AEC, industry regulation wasn't sufficient. So in 1974, the government created the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to be solely responsible for regulation.

In other words, as the technology evolved, so did the policy. Imagine that - policy evolving as you go!

Perhaps we can take a cue from the United Kingdom. When scientists in Britain wish to use human embryonic stem cells in their research, they must first obtain a license from the Human Fertilization and Embryology Authority. Marilyn Robertson, head of the Scottish Stem Cell Network, explains that the authority was already in existence when the debate over stem-cell research began.

"The HFEA existed, but was able to then engage in a public consultation exercise to find out to what extent the public actually supported extending the existing legislation to include human embryonic stem cells," she said.

And the public did support it.

Paul DeSousa, chief scientific officer of Roslin Cells Ltd., explained that the HFEA directly confronts questions about reproductive technology.

"It's asking hard questions about where are we comfortable in our society in sourcing eggs for this technology," he said.

We have those same hard questions to answer in this country too, and it would be helpful if we had a national agency to facilitate the process. Just because the technology has the potential to be abused doesn't mean that prohibition is the answer. And we're capable as a country of making these thoughtful decisions and bringing together science and politics in a healthy way.

Sarah Rothman is a fifth-year Bioengineering Ph.D. candidate and 2002 Engineering alumna from Fayetteville, N.Y. The Sounds of Science appears on Mondays. Her e-mail address is rothman@dailypennsylvanian.com.

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