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Health minister backs stem-cell research
Would allow “therapeutic cloning”
Australian Health Minister Michael Wooldridge has said that he hopes any legislation banning human cloning will contain an exception to allow stem-cell research involving cells taken from the tissues of human embryos produced by cloning. “I think it’s in the public’s interest. It’s enormously exciting. It offers the prospect of a cure for some cancers that we can’t adequately treat now,” Wooldridge told the Network Ten Meet the Press program.
The federal government is seeking agreement from the country’s six states and two territories on uniform national legislation banning human reproductive cloning by mid-2002. However, scientists have appealed for the governments to follow the British model and allow so-called “therapeutic cloning,” which allows the cloning of human beings as long as the newly conceived children are killed while they are still embryos.
Wooldridge said he was sympathetic to concerns expressed by groups such as the Catholic Church about stem-cell research. “But I also, as a doctor, have seen children dying of cancer and I think that to me balances it out,” he said. “On embryonic stem-cell research, when you explain to people the incredible benefits of this and people have a chance to work through the ethical issues around it, I think a majority of people would say there’s a great public benefit here.”