Stem Cell Therapy Germany – Legal Issues
Writing in the journal Nature, Wiedemann, et al (2004), discuss the Delphi Study which aimed to assess the expectations and concerns that stem cell researchers in Germany had over the applications, efficacy, and safety of treatment using stem cells. The researchers found 110 leading German scientists working in basic or applied stem-cell research or involved in the ethical, legal, or societal issues surrounding the techniques. A major concern revealed by the study was that 40% of the final 49 scientists interviewed doubted that serious risks associated with the use of hESCs such as tumor development and false differentiation of transplanted cells would ever be overcome. The majority of those interviewed expressed a desire for future research to focus on the use of adult, autologous stem cells in order to reduce the potential for these problems.
Wiedemann, et al (2004), also asked the scientists about their expectations for the specific application of stem cell treatments and found that many were sceptical in regards to their potential for widespread use in cardiovascular conditions, and in reducing the need for organ transplantation, within the next twenty years. Conversely, all of the scientists considered the widespread use of stem cells in the fields of toxicology and pharmacology as highly likely within fifteen years of the study, and for almost 50% within five years; although, in 2009 this has failed to materialize as predicted.
They also addressed the legal issues surrounding the use of human embryonic stem cells (hESCs), and, as mentioned elsewhere on StemCellTreatments.org, note that the use of these embryos resulted in their destruction. Since the 2004 study researchers have developed a way of extracting the blastocyst from the embryo without necessarily resulting in its death, thereby removing one of the ethical concerns over use of this type of material in research. Traditionally, the ethical standpoint in Germany has centered on the moral rights of the embryo, with the majority affirming a responsibility to respect those moral rights, leading to an inability to conduct research without either a relaxation of the law or developments such as the one just mentioned. Now that the use of autologous stem cells from adult tissue has been refined in terms of increasing the plasticity of the stem cells, the use of embryonic stem cells may become increasingly redundant, removing the need for the argument at all.
