Lerxst

Basically I suffer from a degenerative eye disease called retinitis pigmentosa. It is slowly robbing me of my eyesight, and has already robbed me of my night vision. I have lived for years knowing that I will probably go blind in my 50's. All of my brothers are already legally blind and so is one of my sisters, but this is more from macular degeneration than RP...although they also suffer from RP.

I have recently read some research articles about stem cell research in which human retinal stem cells were found to be able to regenerate in mice. The researchers believed this held great promise. Whether or not they can perfect this treatment to save or correct my vision and that of my siblings, they may be able to save my youngest son's as well as my nieces and nephews. The other implications are just so great with regard to other diseases and disorders it's truly like we are knocking on the door of a medical miracle. Yet there are those out there who are fighting it.

Basically I am not sure why any decent human would protest stem cell research, especially based upon a religious dogma. This is probably an old argument but one I just felt like brining up.

Do you support stem cell research? If not why?

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DarkWizard12

No one is against stem cell research. Only embryonic stem cell research. And since you don't need embryonic stem cells for your disease well, LETS FUND ASC(adult stem cell) RESAERCH! YEA!

azura28

I definitely support it - hope you get help with your eyes before it's too late and it does not affect your job as a cop.

missypea

That's just the pits and I'm sorry to hear that Jeff. I do support stem cell research (all kinds) and I truly hope that we make enough strides forward that you're able to benefit from it.

My mother also suffers from macular degeneration. She's blind in one eye and losing the eyesight in her other. My grandmother also had it and went blind. Poor thing couldn't understand why the doctors just couldn't make her stronger glasses

Lerxst

Okay, I'm a little new to the whole stem cell argument. So what is the deal with embryonic stem cell research? Is it the "it's a baby thing?"

EDIT: Okay now I understand more about the controversy. Personally, I don't see the issue human embryonic stem cell research...then again I'm a human who needs this research to progress. I guess that makes me biased.

DarkWizard12

No, it just makes you another American who wants to waste embryos the same way we waste perfectly good meat for processesd Big Macs.

I get your point though. NEvermind adult stem cells which are proven to have the same capabilities and are quite much more abundant. Lets go take the time to kill a fetus instead! We don't just want progress, we want progress knowing we are killing future productive taxpayers, I-I mean, human beings in the process! After all, how much is life worth? NOTHING!

1069

Like they're not going to waste sitting in vast storage facilities frozen in liquid nitrogen. There are millions of them. What are we saving them for? To breed some mutant army with, two hundred years from now when we develop a cost efficient artificial womb?



More are discarded each year, byproducts of IVF, than are stored.
Millions.

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jfuh

It's horrible to loose any one of our senses. It's even worse if nor horrifying to see a looming dark cloud on the horizon telling you that one day it will come. I applaud your courage and desire to sacrifice yourself as long as it may be of any assistance to our future generations.
Truth be told though any medical procedural breakthrough even with the laboratory phase successfully produced, given the approval process that takes ages as well as political obstacles in the way it will be a while before this will materialize.
A stem cell is a stem cell irregardless of. But there is a crowd that insists on distinguishing between embryonic state and embryonic state. (ie post #2) even though the two are one and the same. An adult stem cell that has been converted back to an embryonic state is then in every sense an embryo but our religious section doesn't seem to think so.

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jfuh

Can you explain to me, aside from the obvious genetic variation, what the difference between a stem cell line derived from boy meets girl embryo vs that from asexually derived embryo?

Lerxst

How do we "waste" them? Are we running out? From what I have read there are certain benefits to embryonic stem cells, although I am just reading what may be opinion. I don't really know enough to say it's a fact one way or the other. How is an embryo that is frozen a human? Why the hell are we keeping them? I tend to ask the question along the lines of what 10 is getting at...how the hell do you put human value on something you are keeping in a jar in a freezer for years?

Sorry, I just don't get that.