In this week’s episode of The Conversation Weekly, as new scientific guidelines are released on embryo research and the use of stem cells, we talk to experts about what’s changed – including a recommendation to relax the 14-day time limit for human embryo research. And we hear about a wave of romantic comedy films emerging from South Africa that are re-imagining the city of Johannesburg.
It’s been five years since the last set of guidelines from the International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR) were published. Since then, scientists have made significant developments in stem cell and embryo research – including the creation of human embryo models and the first human-monkey embryos.
Stem cell research community drops 14-day limit on human embryo research
The Conversation
28 May 2021, 04:40 GMT+10
The International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR), which bills itself as the voice of the stem cell research community, has announced that it no longer endorses the prevailing international standard limiting human embryo research to 14 days after fertilization.
Human embryo research has long been a thorny ethical issue because of competing views about the moral status of the developing embryo. Some people argue that human embryos have the moral status of persons and are considered protectable human life - that embryos should not be used for research, especially research that results in their destruction.
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Sen. Lankford: ‘We shouldn’t need to clarify in law that creating animal-human hybrids … is ethically unthinkable’
Senate Democrats rejected a ban on human-animal chimeras. You read that right. Democrats think Frankenstein monsters are just fine.
The Republicans in the Senate hoped to ban participation in research that created certain chimeras, or human-animal hybrids, in the expectation that the federal government could lift a moratorium on funding for those projects.
A party-line vote saw 48 Republicans supporting the measure. The 49 nays included 47 Democrats and two [communist] independents –Sens. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Angus King, I-ME. Sens. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., didn’t vote.