problems with stem cell research

what's the right thing to do? what's the appropriate way about goingabout this? does this question have any answer? over the last several years, stem cellresearch has been associated with a lot of enthusiasm, but it's also beenassociated with a lot of ethical issues. recently we've seen a lot attention and alot of scientific excitement over ips, or inducedpluripotent stem cell research. this is very exciting science. >> you can take a skin cell like acheek swab

or you know medical waste from a procedureand take those cells, give them a little sort of fountainof youth cocktail, and turn them into something that is likeembryonic stems cells. that, that can turn into it is prettypotent that can turn into any cell in the humanbody. science by its nature moves very quicklyand unpredictably and generally out of thepublic spotlight. so, it's generally not until after the science the initial science has alreadybeen

produced and published that policy makersor the general public actually hear about it. when president obama issued his executiveorder rescinding the bush administration orderhe directed the national institutes of health todevelop guidelines for federal funding ofembryonic stem-cell research. and it's dramatically increased the amountof stem-cell research that's actually funded here inthe us. so the national academy's guidelines,which were the first set of

guidelines out there at all in the unitedstates for governing stem-cell research, arose out of theinterest of scientists who understood very clearly that this was a, a sociallycontroversial area of science. and in the absence of any federalregulation, went to the national academies and said, pleasedevelop guidance, develop a, a system under which we can operate sothat we are accountable and so that we prevent,you know, bad outcomes. [music] scientists go into science to do sciencenot to do law, so we developed

a project, or looking at internationalcollaboration in stem cell research in the context ofthis highly varied landscape of, of policies governing stemcell research. and this turned out to be the beginning ofwhat we now call the hinxton group. which is an international consortium of scientists, ethicists, policy makers,lawyers, philosophers who are interested in as i said before, fostering ethically andscientifically defensible research. >> some of the most heated ethicalcontroversies

related to embryonic stem cell researchhave related to the fact that embryos need to be destroyed in order to create embryonicstem cell lines. professional groups were coming into thepicture saying, we know that there are ethical issuesinvolved. we know that there are different laws locally, nationally and internationally,and they wanted to provide scientists with a way ofnegotiating among these different laws and, andethical norms.

under the national academy of sciences,this is known as an escrow, nothing to do with themortgage crisis. but the embryonic stem cell researchoversight committee for the isscr, the international society of stem cellresearch, they recommend a scroc. a stem cell research oversight committeebecause they took on a larger task of not just looking at the ethical issues with embryonic stemcell research, but those of all sorts of stemcells. at hopkins, we obviously took notice ofthese major national and

international guidelines, assembled acommittee of people from across the university, given that we do a considerable amount of stemcell research and made a decision to proceed with establishing anscroc here at johns hopkins. we constructed a multidisciplinary committee that includes scientists,includes ethicists, attorneys and non institutionalmembers so we have relevant expertise in the room to considerthe range of issues that are associated with stemcell research.

if a scientist at john hopkins wants to doresearch involving human embryonic stem cells, either research directed at deriving new human embryonic stem celllines or doing laboratory work involvingexisting human embryonic stem cell lines, then she or he has to come to thescroc for approval for that research. >> what bioethicist and, and folks likemyself who are scientists, who are doing work in ethics and policy try to dois, to get ahead of that curve a bit. so to try to forecast, by speaking withscientists and working with scientists, try to identify what arethose issues that are

coming down the pike scientifically, thatare gonna be of interest and potentially of concern to the generalpublic and to policymakers. and to try to be proactive aboutdeveloping guidance for how policymakers and the public might regard or regulate oroversee emerging technologies. >> being in the field of bioethics isfantastic. you get to take the hardest questions, thethings that people talk about at the dinner tableor at a cocktail party and really study them,really try to figure out what's the right thingto do.

what's the appropriate way about goingabout this. [music].