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Dear Mr. Chairman:
We write to express our grave concern about
legislation currently pending in Maryland (House Bill 482). It is
designed to authorize human cloning ("somatic cell nuclear
transplantation") and the harvesting and use of body parts taken from
human clones in the embryonic and fetal stages of development. This
legislation, if enacted, threatens to make Maryland a haven for unethical
medical practices, including the macabre practice of human fetal farming.
The pending legislation expressly authorizes the
harvesting and use of human embryonic stem cells, human embryonic germ
cells (generally harvested around the 8th week of fetal
development), and even human adult stem cells that originate from the
human cloning method known as somatic cell nuclear transplantation. Thus
the bill contemplates the creation of new human beings by cloning and,
perhaps unintentionally, their cultivation from the zygote stage through
the newborn stage for the purpose of harvesting what the legislation
itself refers to as "cadaveric" fetal tissue.
Please pause to consider whose cadaver the
tissue is to be derived from. It is the cadaver of a distinct member of
the species Homo sapiens—a human being—who would be brought into being by
cloning and, presumably, implanted and permitted to develop to the desired
stage of physical maturation for the purpose of being killed for the
harvesting of his or her tissues.
Although the legislation purports to ban trafficking
in fetal body parts for "valuable consideration," it expressly permits
"reasonable payment" for "removal, processing, disposal, preservation,
quality control, storage, transplantation, or implantation" of these body
parts. This is a virtual invitation to cloning entrepreneurs to conduct
in the State of Maryland what would amount to fetal farming for research,
presumably including experimental treatments. There seems to be nothing
in the legislation to prevent cloning entrepreneurs from paying women a
"reasonable" fee to gestate embryos and submit to abortions for the
production of human bodily tissues and organs. The entrepreneurs could
then charge a "reasonable" fee to their customers for "processing,"
"preserving," "storing," "transplanting," or "implanting" fetal cadavers
and tissues.
And what if a gestating woman has second thoughts and
decides not to abort the developing fetus? Would a court be asked to
enforce a contract for abortion? We hope and trust that no court would do
that. But then we would have what the sponsors of the legislation surely
would not want to facilitate: the birth of human clones.
We understand, and deeply share, your desire and the
desire of the sponsors of this legislation to promote biomedical advances,
cure dreaded diseases, and ease human suffering. We hope that Maryland
will be at the forefront of exciting research involving stem cells derived
without harming living human beings at any stage of development. The
approach marked out in HB 482, however, is not an ethically sound way to
go. On the contrary, it constitutes the moral madness of killing in the
cause of healing—with a possible profit motive that would encourage the
grisly practice.
Under separate cover, we are sending a copy of
Human Cloning and Human Dignity, the Report of the President's Council
on Bioethics, chaired by Dr. Leon Kass, on which we have the honor to
serve. The Report recommends (unanimously) a ban on cloning for the
purpose of baby-making and (by a vote of 10-7) a four year moratorium on
cloning for biomedical research. Please note that though seven of the
seventeen members of the Council support cloning for biomedical research
(subject to strict federal regulations), none indicated support for the
implantation and gestation of cloned embryos for the purpose of harvesting
cadaveric fetal tissues or organs, not to mention maintaining cloned
humans to the point at which adult stem cells could be harvested.
Yours sincerely,
Robert P. George, J.D., D.Phil.
Mary Ann Glendon, J.D., LL.M
Princeton University Harvard
University
Alfonso Gomez-Lobo, D.Phil.
William Hurlbut, M.D.
Georgetown University Stanford
University
Gilbert Meilaender, Ph.D.
Valparaiso
University |
