• Question: So much work and research has been put into stem cells, do you agree that all this knowledge will go to waste if stem cell research is not legalized?

    Asked by vampire1234 to Anzy, Aoife, Dave, Matt, Tomasz on 12 Nov 2013.
    • Photo: David Christensen

      David Christensen answered on 12 Nov 2013:

      Stem cell research is legal as we do it in our labs. There are tight regulations to make sure that we aren’t doing anything too crazy, but mostly we can do what we want, if we work in a lab that is allowed to use embryonic stem cells. We don’t yet have cures from diseases using stem cells because we need to do more research.

      If stem cell research was to be made illegal now, then we could probably still use some of the results from our research for other things and it would not be a waste. For example, embryonic stem cells are a lot like cancer cells in that they grow quickly and they use a lot of glucose sugar. Some things that we find out about stem cells might be useful for scientists who study cancer. Fortunately, I don’t think stem cell research will be made illegal in this country, so I can keep on doing my job!

    • Photo: Matthew Tomlinson

      Matthew Tomlinson answered on 14 Nov 2013:

      Hi vampire1234

      Stem cell laws vary all over the world, in the UK we have decided to allow research into embryonic stem cells, but only under strict ethical guidelines. Countries like the US now allow embryonic stem cell research but for a while it was banned due to ethical concerns from some groups. However there are some countries where stem cell therapy is completely unregulated, this is really worrying as there are so many potential problems if you don’t control the stem cells properly.

      I think in the UK we strike a good balance between allowing the research, but making sure it is done properly with all the controls in place to make sure things don’t go wrong. We also allow research with adult stem cells from places like the bone marrow, these cells need less regulation because there are less ethical concerns, although people do need to allow their cells to be used for research.

      Overall I don’t think this research will be wasted, there is so much work being done and the government recently said regenerative medicine and stem cell therapy is a key area of research and potential economic growth. So I think we’ll see treatments coming through soon, and I should still have a job!

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