BODY PARTS HARVESTING

Article found at: http://www.bound4lifesd.com/

This may sound like a Hollywood horror movie, but as they say, truth is stranger than fiction.

Dr. Robert P. George is a member of the President's Council on Bioethics.

Dr. George believes that the long-term goal of many of the embryonic researchers is "to create an industry in harvesting late embryonic and fetal body parts”.*

Imagine an industry that grows babies till they are 5 months or older and then uses their body parts for medical purposes. These researchers don't dare to openly admit to this barbaric practice because they know there would be a public outrage. Instead, their strategy is to sway public opinion by promoting the “promised benefits” of embryonic stem cell research.

Scientists are currently engaged in many types of stem cell research. The top three are adult stem cell research, nuclei transfer cloning and embryonic stem cell research.

Before we look at these types of research let review some basic biology. If you take a human egg from a mother and fertilize it with a father’s sperm, the moment the sperm cell penetrates the mother’s egg, something amazing happens. The DNA in the egg is completely and uniquely changed. DNA is kind of like a biological computer code. It’s the directions the cell’s follow to create a human being.

When the mothers egg is fertilized it becomes a human embryo. This new person now has half of the mothers DNA and half of the fathers DNA. This new little person now has a DNA code that is completely different from anyone else in the world. If you have siblings, they also share half of each of your parents DNA, but it’s not exactly the same half that you have!

In the bible it says “a man will leave his father and mother and be united to his wife, and they will become one flesh.”**

DNA shows that this is exactly what happens. Each child shares half of their design code from their father and the other half from their mother. It’s true, everyone in the world is entirely unique!

Stem cells are specialized cells that can become virtually any type of human cell. If your DNA instructs them to become a liver, they will. If your DNA instructs them to become a kidney they will.

In embryonic stem cell research the stem cells are taken from a human embryo. The process destroys the embryo. To date there have been no cures from embryonic stem cell research in spite of millions of dollars spent by private research corporations. California also spends 300 million dollars a year.

Another type of stem cell research is nuclei transfer cloning. All human cells consist of different parts. The place in our cells where the DNA can be found is called the nucleus. To achieve this type of cloning researchers take a human egg and remove the nuclei. That egg no longer has any DNA information. Next we take a cell from a adult human being. The egg and the adult cell are placed side by side. A small amount of electricity is run through the two cells. The two cells will fuse together into one cell. The egg now has the entire DNA from the adult cell. This egg if allowed to grow will become an exact duplicate of the adult that supplied the cell. He will be younger, but a twin of the adult cell donor.

In New Jersey, “it's now legal to create a human cloned embryo and gestate it up to the point of birth.” "If you harvest the tissues before the clone is born, you're still within New Jersey law." ***

The other type of stem cell research is adult stem cell research. One way to gather adult stem cells is to remove them from a living human adult, causing no real harm to the person donating the adult stem cells. Dr. Nagy Habib, is a surgeon who works at the London's Imperial College in Great Britain. He has taken adult stem cells from his own patients' blood and re-inserted the cells into the patients' livers. Within two months, the majority of the patients treated by Dr. Habib showed considerable improvement in liver function. Those patients who showed no improvement in their disease did not get worse.*

Clearly God is blessing adult stem cell research.

There have been about 65 successful treatments found through adult stem cell research. There have been no cures found with embryonic stem cell research. Why is the medical and research industry continuing to downplay the benefits of adult stem cell research? Perhaps Dr. George’s conclusion is true, that the ultimate goal of those in favor of embryonic stem cell research is to gradually desensitize the public to the idea of body part harvesting. May God have mercy on our nation.

We as the Church of Christ must stand against this with all we possess.

*Fetal Attraction, The Weekly Standard, Dr. Robert P. George 10/03/05.
**The Holy Bible New International Version, Genesis 2:24.
***Stem-Cell Bills Put On Hold , Citizen Link, Pete Winn, 10-21-05

Based on an article written by Ian Johnson, Science Correspondent for news.scotsman.com.