 Obama told House Democrats at a retreat at a Virginia resort he will sign an executive order widening federal funding for embryonic stem cell research |
A new report in the medical journal PLoS Medicine details the case of a boy treated for a rare condition with fetal stem cell injections who developed cancerous tumors as a result.
“This is the first report of a human brain tumor complicating neural stem cell therapy,” the report from the Israeli research team said. “The findings here suggest that neuronal stem-progenitor cells may be involved in gliomagenesis and provide the first example of a donor-derived brain tumor.
“Further work is urgently needed to assess the safety of these therapies,” the study said.
Word of the warning came just as the Associated Press reported that shares of stem-cell developers rocketed this week in anticipation of an executive order from President Obama that he would institute federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research programs. The funding was sharply curtailed by President Bush under a pro-life agenda he followed.
The report said the ban to be lifted identified only embryonic stem cells, which are collected by cloning human embryos in labs. The use of the cells requires killing the embryo.
The new medical report said the case developed in a patient with the rare ataxia telangiectasia, a condition involving the degeneration of the brain region that controls movement and speech. It apparently is caused by the halt in production of a certain protein.
 Evidence of limb, hair and teeth can be seen in teratoma cell |
The report said starting in 2001, fetal neural stem cells were injected several times into the patient’s brain and surrounding fluid surrounding during treatments in Moscow.
Then in 2005, recurrent headaches prompted doctors at Sheba Medical Center in Israel to order magnetic resonance imaging scans on the patient.
“The scan revealed abnormal growths in his brain and spinal cord. In September 2006, when the boy was 14, the spinal cord growth was surgically removed. This growth has never reappeared but the mass in the boy’s brain has continued to grow slowly,” the report said.
“The [study] findings indicate that the growth in the patient’s spinal cord was donor-cell derived and contained cells from two or more donors, at least one of whom was female,” the study said.
“There are potential dangers associated with stem cell therapy, such as malignant transformation. The injection of pluripotent … cells in rodents leads frequently to the development of teratomas or teratocarcinomas,” the report said.
“This first example of a donor-derived brain tumor developing after fetal neural cell transplantation is worrying and suggests that further work should be done to assess the safety of this therapy,” the study said.
“Patients, please beware,” Dr. John Gearhart, a stem cell scientist in Pennsylvania who wasn’t involved in the Israel case, told the AP.
“Cells are not drugs. They can misbehave in so many different ways, it just is going to take a good deal of time” to refine treatments, he said.
Victims of A-T Degeneration typically lose their ability to move, and because of typically faulty immune systems allowing infections and cancers, they usually die in their teens or early 20s.
WND previously reported that Obama, in a closed-door meeting with House Democrats at their retreat at the posh Kingsmill Golf Resort in Williamsburg, Va., gave his “guarantee” he will sign an executive order overturning Bush’s executive order restricting federal funding for embryonic stem cell research.
Obama’s reversal of Bush’s policy comes in the face of scientific evidence that more than two decades of embryonic stem cell research have failed to produce medically valuable results, while adult stem cell research has resulted in successful medical treatments for a wide range of illnesses.
By using an executive order to approve embryonic stem cell research for human therapeutic uses, the Obama administration plans to bypass congressional discussion and debate, seeking instead to reverse the Bush executive order without introducing any new legislation, the Washington Times reported.
Obama appears determined to push the embryonic stem cell political agenda, despite medical concerns that therapeutic results in human medical treatments over decades have proved that adult stem cells and stem cells derived from human placenta produce results, while embryonic stem cells produce tumors hazardous to human health.
“Most of the media report only ‘stem cell’ research, not distinguishing between embryonic stem cells and adult stem cells,” David Prentice, senior fellow for life sciences at the Family Research Council, told WND.
“Embryonic stem cell research relies upon the destruction of a young human embryo,” he emphasized. “You have to cannibalize a young human life to get embryonic human stem cells, something you do not need to do if you work with adult stem cells.”
WND reported the Food and Drug Administration approved within three days of President Obama’s inauguration the first permission ever granted to begin testing embryonic stem cell treatments on human subjects. The FDA approved an application from Geron Corporation, based in Menlo Park, Calif., to inject stem cells derived from human embryos into people paralyzed from the chest down by spinal cord injuries.
