A brave Reeve got it wrong

Quadriplegic actor's support of embryonic stem cell research was misguided

My Glass is Half Full

By MARK PICKUP

There were a number of similarities between Christopher Reeve's life and my own:

• Christopher Reeve and I were close in age.
• Both Reeve and I had careers cut short by disability (he with spinal cord injury and I with multiple sclerosis).
• We both lived in electric wheelchairs surrounded by contraptions of disability.
• Both Reeve and I enjoyed the support of a loving family throughout a long catastrophic disability.
• Like Reeve, I hope stem cell research might develop a therapy to reverse the effects of my disability.

Adult stem cells

Susan Fajt, 27, became spinal cord injured in 2001. In June 2003, she received a stem cell transplant taken from her own sinus area. Fajt has regained sensation and can now walk with the aid of braces. This past July, she appeared before a U.S. Senate committee and said, "I am now preparing to shed the shell of this wheelchair, which has confined me for over two years ."

Laura Dominquez, 19, of Texas also appeared before the Senate committee. She was paralyzed from the neck down in a car accident three years ago. Like Christopher Reeve, she suffered a high spinal cord injury. After a transplant of her own stem cells into the spinal injury site, she began to regain feeling and movement in her legs. Laura is now able to stand and slowly walk with minimal assistance.

You can read both testimonies online at (www.stemcellresearch.org/testimony/index.html)

There is a certain cruelty in misleading a desperate man to place hope where there's little reason for it.

These women, and other people with spinal cord injuries, received adult stem therapies. There is not one successful treatment - not even the hint of one - to come from embryonic stem cells. And I want to help you understand this critical point. Even if Christopher Reeve had access to experimental embryonic stem cell therapy, he would have still died quadriplegic.

The secular media tends to lump all stem cell research together. It may be convenient, but it is also lazy and inaccurate reporting. This has been a source of confusion to the public.

The Catholic Church is not opposed to stem cell research. Quite the contrary. The Church enthusiastically supports it - but not embryonic stem cell research. During a 2001 visit with President Bush, Pope John Paul restated his opposition to embryonic stem cell research by saying:

"Experience is already showing how a tragic coarsening of consciences accompanies the assault on innocent human life in the womb, leading to accommodation and acquiescence in the face of other related evils such as euthanasia, infanticide and, most recently, proposals for the creation for research purposes of human embryos, destined to be destroyed in the process."

Even if I was not a religious man, I would oppose destroying embryos (or any other human life) for research. I would oppose it on human rights grounds. We must remember that human life begins at conception. This is not opinion; it is plain scientific fact established decades ago. It may not be fashionable. But it is a fact nonetheless.

Nazi war crimes were tried at Nuremberg in 1946. The Nuremberg Code for medical conduct regarding human experimentation came out of that trial. The world was horrified by the callous disregard and destruction of human life displayed by Nazi medical doctors. Why isn't the world appalled at the prospect of wanton destruction of human life in embryonic stem cell research?

The Nuremberg Code laid down standards to be followed when conducting human experimentation. This code is accepted worldwide as a standard of ethical medical behaviour. The essence and spirit of this universal ethical standard should apply to all human life, not just some.

Perhaps someone will respond that in Canada unborn human life is not considered a legal person. So what? Women were not considered legal persons in Canada until 1929. Personhood is a legal argument used to cloak bigotry against one group of humanity or another.

Remember Nuremberg

Disregard for the value of human life before birth (or after) is not good for society. It never has been. Stem cell research and therapies can be procured by many other methods far more promising than embryonic sources. Embryonic stem cell research violates the spirit and intent of the Nuremberg Code and the concept of universal human rights and equality of human life.

After more than 20 years with multiple sclerosis I know what it's like to be devalued and disregarded by society. Why would I now turn to disregard the value of the very youngest members of the human family by willfully benefiting from the death of embryos?

Christopher Reeve's death made the world poorer. He did much to raise public awareness of disability issues. But his focus on embryonic stem cell research was wrong. I believe he meant well, but was misguided and misinformed by an aggressive embryonic stem cell lobby.

There is a certain cruelty in misleading a desperate man to place hope where there's little reason for it.

Copyright © 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009 -- Western Catholic Reporter