Ignoring Success - to Promote "Cloning" - In the Name of Politics

Though he didn't use the "C" word, Ron Reagan, Jr. perfectly described the human cloning process in his speech to the DNC Convention Tuesday night, touting it as a way to produce embryonic stem cells and have "your own personal biological repair kit". Promising potential cures with embryonic stem cells for a wide range of diseases, what Ron completely forgot to mention was that these same diseases have already been successfully treated with adult stem cells. Hundreds of patients have already benefited from adult stem cell treatments - spinal cord injury patients who have gotten out of their wheelchairs, multiple sclerosis patients whose symptoms were stopped, a Parkinson's patient whose symptoms went away and then went on an African safari, cancer patients in remission - all with their own "built-in repair kit", adult stem cells.

Ron also neglected to mention that harvesting embryonic stem cells from human embryos causes their death, and that cloning creates new human beings who are destroyed to harvest their cells like a crop. Cloning also requires a tremendous number of human eggs (at least 850 million to make clones for the diabetes patients in the U.S.); a tremendous health hazard for women who undergo the procedure. If we are really interested in treating diseases, adult stem cells are the ones that promise real treatments for real patients, without harvesting young humans.