I think permission should be received and education given to the individual who authorizes it. that wasn't the case with Henrietta Lacks.

OP, what are your credentials to explain cell culture to the "uninitiated"????

I thought this was now a non-issue since cell lines could be started from cells in umbilical cords? I doubt that aborted fetuses are absolutely necessary for this research. There has been so much fraud and under-the-table money that I don't trust anything from these research peddlers.

schmendeler said:

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are credentials required to discuss things on texags, now?

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When you set yourself up as an authority to explain a process to the less enlightened, it's good to know. I am sure the numerous physicians, clinicians, and bioscienttific engineers would appreciate it. The very same OP once questioned the expertise of a Duke educated physician on this forum, after he simply provided a dissenting opinion on a topic. Funny, you didn't seem too bothered that time.

Automated Chatbot said:

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schmendeler said:

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are credentials required to discuss things on texags, now?

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When you set yourself up as an authority to explain a process to the less enlightened, it's good to know. I am sure the numerous physicians, clinicians, and bioscienttific engineers would appreciate it. The very same OP once questioned the expertise of a Duke educated physician on this forum, after he simply provided a dissenting opinion on a topic. Funny, you didn't seem too bothered that time.

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he was laying out information about the topic, I didn't see him say that he was an expert.

as for this thread featuring a duke educated physician, I don't have any idea what you're talking about.

In an ideal world, the original cell line donors would be asked for consent, and duly compensated for being the life line of an industry.

The fact that these came from abortions make that a moral conundrum. Should someone profit from the murder of their child?

Selling umbelical cord cells from a baby clears up a lot of this.

Can you mandate all future research must come from consenting, compensated families that did not abort?

AstroAg17 said:

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I can't find anything about using cord stem cells for this type of thing. If they can be used for this, can someone link something that talks about it?

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I was just going off of what I was reading earlier. I thought someone mentioned umbilical cords replacing aborted fetuses.

I do know umbilical cords have a ton of stem cells in them though.

I think there are two really big issues here. First, and more cut-and-dried, is the issue of ownership. If someone has a cell line taken from your body, then you should have ownership of that unless you decide to relinquish it. Sale, licensing, and oversight are all valid arrangements. There have been several examples of researchers using cells taken from a person and getting the intellectual property rights for them without compensating the person the cells came from. Unless you're the corporate lawyer for the researchers I really don't see any moral ambiguity here.

Second and more complicated is the use of aborted tissue to create cell lines. The issue of what to do with research gained by unethical means is a broad topic in medicine. For example, the Nazis performed a lot of experiments in the concentration camps, and the Japanese did as well in China during WW2, and Americans did in several cases such as Tuskeegee. That research tells us a lot about human tolerance for extreme conditions, the full courses of diseases, and other things you would never be able to learn using ethical means. That information can also save lives by helping us design better safety systems and knowing when to treat aggressively when someone has injury or exposure to elements or disease. However, none of those people consented to be part of an experiment, and you don't want to give the perpetrators of these atrocities a "silver lining" that might make doing these sorts of things ever so slighty less damnable. So it's a bit of a conundrum. Do you jettison valid knowledge that could save lives because it was obtained through horrific means? Or do you use it, knowing that in some tiny way you're sanctioning those activities?

I'm sure they do now. But what should we do with things like HeLa cells that we obtained without consent? In my humble opinion we should phase those out. It's not like we lack for cell lines or other tissue models. There are thousands, and as long it you give the transition a few years it shouldn't be a big deal.

I guess then we get into the area of having to decide just how bad the means of something should be before it should be retired.

should Volkswagen cease operations because it was founded out of Nazi Germany?

should the US overhaul our constitution because it was written at least partially by slave owners?

should we dissolve the US because it was founded by stealing the land from native americans?

why prevent good from coming out of something bad?

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why prevent good from coming out of something bad?

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Imagine a woman getting counseling at an abortion clinic, and part of that counseling includes a statement that her aborted fetus will be used to generate a cell lines for medical research, and that the embryonic stem cells could be used to help treat medical conditions. Regardless of left or right, most people agree that abortion is a bad thing.

However, when you start using a bad thing to do good things, suddenly that bad thing doesn't look so bad anymore. Instead of "do I abort my pregnancy because of a terrible situation" or "do I complete the pregnancy and keep the infant or give the infant up for adoption", the question becomes "do I abort my pregnancy to further medical research and help all these people" or "do I complete the pregnancy...". The second sounds like choosing between two good options, while the first sounds like a good option and a bad option. You could even push it further and say that the woman who is completing her pregnancy is doing so selfishly, because just think how much good those fetal stem cells and cell lines could do for others and humanity in general if she decided to abort?

Or lets say the Tuskeegee experiments eventually led to the diagnosis and cure of many more people than would otherwise have received appropriate and timely syphilis treatment due to better understanding of the disease. Lets say 10 million people over a few centuries. Only a few hundred were part of the experiment. So in the end the Tuskeegee experiments would be a net good? Going forward people would be much more likely to perform similar unethical experiments if they thought the balance would eventually absolve them.

So there is a very strong argument to be made that we should destroy unethical research as both a punishment to the researchers and as an affirmation to human dignity

ramblin_ag02 said:

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why prevent good from coming out of something bad?

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Imagine a woman getting counseling at an abortion clinic, and part of that counseling includes a statement that her aborted fetus will be used to generate a cell lines for medical research, and that the embryonic stem cells could be used to help treat medical conditions. Regardless of left or right, most people agree that abortion is a bad thing.

However, when you start using a bad thing to do good things, suddenly that bad thing doesn't look so bad anymore. Instead of "do I abort my pregnancy because of a terrible situation" or "do I complete the pregnancy and keep the infant or give the infant up for adoption", the question becomes "do I abort my pregnancy to further medical research and help all these people" or "do I complete the pregnancy...". The second sounds like choosing between two good options, while the first sounds like a good option and a bad option. You could even push it further and say that the woman who is completing her pregnancy is doing so selfishly, because just think how much good those fetal stem cells and cell lines could do for others and humanity in general if she decided to abort?

Or lets say the Tuskeegee experiments eventually led to the diagnosis and cure of many more people than would otherwise have received appropriate and timely syphilis treatment due to better understanding of the disease. Lets say 10 million people over a few centuries. Only a few hundred were part of the experiment. So in the end the Tuskeegee experiments would be a net good? Going forward people would be much more likely to perform similar unethical experiments if they thought the balance would eventually absolve them.

So there is a very strong argument to be made that we should destroy unethical research as both a punishment to the researchers and as an affirmation to human dignity

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I disagree. way too simplistic.

just because something good manages to come out of something bad, doesn't mean that you are approving of the bad thing.

organ donations aren't bad because someone had to die (in the case of a heart, etc.) in order for it to happen.

I think you punish the people who did "bad" but it only makes more suffering to discard what value there might be derived from their poor motives.

is hitler validated because wernher von braun was the father of space flight? is the moon mission tainted by the experience of a man who worked for the Nazis?

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is hitler validated because wernher von braun was the father of space flight? is the moon mission tainted by the experience of a man who worked for the Nazis?

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And you say I'm being simplistic? I intentionally avoided further reference to Nazi's because there is no meaningful conversation to be had about them. However, both the abortion and Tuskeegee scenarios track close to current facts. If something good is coming out of something bad, at some point the merits of the good versus the bad becomes subjective.

What if China starts doing heinous medical experiments on their death row inmates and publishes the results? I think most would agree we should boycott that research, regardless of how groundbreaking or lifesaving it could be.

ramblin_ag02 said:

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is hitler validated because wernher von braun was the father of space flight? is the moon mission tainted by the experience of a man who worked for the Nazis?

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And you say I'm being simplistic? I intentionally avoided further reference to Nazi's because there is no meaningful conversation to be had about them. However, both the abortion and Tuskeegee scenarios track close to current facts. If something good is coming out of something bad, at some point the merits of the good versus the bad becomes subjective.

What if China starts doing heinous medical experiments on their death row inmates and publishes the results? I think most would agree we should boycott that research, regardless of how groundbreaking or lifesaving it could be.

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Chinese scientists torture thousands of people to death, but come up with the cure to cancer from their results.

1. those scientists should be imprisoned/punished.

2. cancer is cured.

are you saying that the cure to cancer should be ignored because of the terrible things they did to get it?

how does letting a small child die of leukemia bring back the people that were murdered?

that makes zero sense to me.

Lets look at the situation this way:

1) Theoretical Chinese scientists torture children as part of research
2) This research ends up curing cancer
3) These scientists get punished
4) This type of research is prohibited

If you are willing to accept 1,2,and 3 without issue then 4 becomes meaningless. African researchers see this example and torture thousands of black HIV patients in order to cure HIV. They get punished but HIV gets cured. Then Indians torture thousands to cure malaria. Then Venezuela tortures thousands to cure tuberculosis. The greater good is always a great justification for any number of atrocities. Most in the medical field refuse to build a better world on the bodies of innocent victims in this one.

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So what do y'all think? Is the continued use of these cell lines acceptable? Is the production of new fetal cell lines acceptable if the person who elects to abort isn't incentivized? Is it just acceptable in all cases?

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1. Acceptable and moral are two different things People accept and commit immoral acts all of the time.
2. If we are concerned about morality, then we need an objective moral line which can only exist if God exists in order to determine what is moral.

Because I believe God exists and defines the moral line, what I see in the scriptures is that murder is immoral. (Especially shedding innocent blood). Which would make an abortion = murder.

There are a few sinful practices associated with interaction with a human body once it's dead.

Example: If I'm a donor, die and have a wreck, there's nothing immoral about a doctor taking my liver and giving it to someone else. If I donate my body to science so that people can learn, that's seems okay too. It's not okay to murder me.

Production of new fetal lines = killing more babies then this is not acceptable. While there may be a potential benefit of using new lines, do we really trust humanity to no encourage murder if it's profitable and legal.

Alternatives: Why not collect cells from babies that were miscarried? With the parents permission of course.

ramblin_ag02 said:

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Lets look at the situation this way:

1) Theoretical Chinese scientists torture children as part of research
2) This research ends up curing cancer
3) These scientists get punished
4) This type of research is prohibited

If you are willing to accept 1,2,and 3 without issue then 4 becomes meaningless. African researchers see this example and torture thousands of black HIV patients in order to cure HIV. They get punished but HIV gets cured. Then Indians torture thousands to cure malaria. Then Venezuela tortures thousands to cure tuberculosis. The greater good is always a great justification for any number of atrocities. Most in the medical field refuse to build a better world on the bodies of innocent victims in this one.

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what about the next step? --> 5) what to do with the cure for cancer?

I would say that you take the cure and put it to good use, despite the way that it was obtained.

are you saying that the cure for cancer must be ignored because of the despicable way that it was obtained?

what is the level of bad involved in something that is allowable before it must be discarded?

I feel like your last two sentences are implying that I think it's ok for people to do such things. I do not. I don't sanction them leaving a trail of suffering and bodies in their wake.

I'm probably explaining this poorly.

As a rule, unethical medical research is much more productive than ethical medical research. After all, ethics only create limits on research, and unethical research is limitless. Also, medical research has a vast potential to help the suffering, earn income, and earn fame. These are some of the most powerful motivating factors known to humankind.

So how do you prevent unethical research when it is more efficient, more productive, and more lucrative to be unethical? One common way is to reject unethical research results

I get all of that. Harsh punishments for cruel/unethical medical research practices are fine by me.

My point is that even given all of that, ill gotten gains are still gains. Do you not see an ethical dilemma from the pain and suffering caused by attempting to discourage people from acting unethically in the future?

I see it, and that's why I said initially that it gets complicated. Yes, you can ease suffering of sick people using ill-gotten data. But you can also prevent future suffering of research subjects by rejecting ill-gotten data. People suffer either way, suffering is decreased either way. But for me it's more palatable to let injury, illness, or disease cause suffering than if that suffering is caused by a willful human act