It is no secret that the Vatican and most researchers on human embryonic stem cells do not see eye to eye on much more than the time of day. So the real question is why the Third International Congress on Responsible Stem Cell Research, scheduled for 25–28 April, was organised at all, rather than why it was abruptly cancelled this week.
Its website cited “serious economic and logistic-organizational reasons”. But an unnamed source in the Vatican’s Pontifical Academy for Life, told the Catholic News Agency that “the presence on its program of so many speakers, including the keynote speaker, committed to embryonic stem cell research, was a betrayal of the mission of the Academy and a public scandal.”
The keynote speaker was George Q. Daley, of Harvard University, an ardent supporter of research on human embryos. Another was Alan Trounson, president of the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, a pioneer in IVF.
There are few areas in bioethics which require more philosophical subtlety than determining when death happens in organ donation. But an NPR feature this week on the controversial problem of donation after cardiac death has highlighted an area which is even more controversial.
The dead donor rule – the golden rule of transplant surgeons -- is that vital organs may be taken only from patients who are unequivocally dead. Death is determined by the cessation of brain activity (brain death) or by the irreversible cessation of circulation and respiration (cardiac death).
But what does irreversible mean? Some transplant teams wait 5 whole minutes before removing organs, others 2, other only 75 seconds -- even though, in very rare cases, patients have revived after more than 2 minutes.
Former US vice president Dick Cheney, a 71-year-old, received a new heart recently. He had been on a waiting list for more than 20 months but inevitably the operation sparked speculation that he had jumped the queue. Cardiologists told the Bloomberg news service that this was unlikely.
"The current process of waiting for a heart, being listed for a heart, and how donor organs are handled is the most transparent, clearest process that is really hard to corrupt," said Mariell Jessup, of the University of Pennsylvania. "It’s not the age, it's the mileage," she told Bloomberg. "Issues other than age determine how well a patient will do. A 70-year-old that has a heart transplant can expect an excellent probability to live five or 10 years or longer with a superb quality of life, as long as they don't have other medical problems."
Oregon’s public health division has released statistics on deaths under its physician-assisted suicide (PAS) legislation. It shows a steady increase in the number of lethal prescriptions and in the number of deaths. In 1998, the first year after PAS was legalised, there were 24 prescriptions and 16 deaths. In 2011, there were 114 prescriptions and 71 deaths. A total of 935 people have had lethal prescriptions and 596 have died.
62 doctors wrote 114 prescriptions, with some writing up to 14 prescriptions each. Some doctors knew the patient for only one week before writing the prescriptions. It is known that some doctors are prominent prescribers of lethal barbiturates for assisted suicide.
A parliamentary committee in Quebec has recommended the legalisation of euthanasia with strict safeguards. Its report, “Mourir dans la dignité” (Dying With Dignity), contends that dying is a part of life and since medical assistance is used to prolong life, it should also be used in extreme cases to end it.
The report is available only in French at the moment. An English version will be published in May.
Instead of framing the proposal as a human right, the committee has described euthanasia as an advanced stage of palliative care. “This approach abandons the debate over the legalization of euthanasia to situate it in terms of appropriate end-of-life care,” said Véronique Hivon, the co-chair of the committee.
The report acknowledges that there could be constitutional snags. Euthanasia is illegal in Canada’s federal law. If the Quebec parliament legalises it, it would still be a crime in the other provinces. However, in Canada’s…
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One of the first doctors to support Oregon’s controversial assisted-suicide law has used it to end his own life. Dr Peter Goodwin was diagnosed with a rare brain disease, corticobasal degeneration. This condition can affect balance, muscle control and speech, as well as cognitive abilities, as it progresses. Last September, Goodwin said he was considering when might be the right time to die. He was not sure at the time, saying: “I don't want to die…No way do I want to die. I enjoy life; I enjoy company; I enjoy my friends. I have many, many, many friends.” He was almost 83.
Oregon’s law allows doctors to prescribe medication to hasten the death of a patient who are believed to have six months to live. The patient must be mentally competent and must administer the medication to him or herself. Goodwin was concerned that he might lose his ability to use the law.…
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Karen Capato gave birth to twins in 2003 – 18 months after the death of her husband, Robert Capato. Are her twins eligible for “survivor benefits”? The US Supreme Court grappled this week for the first time with “posthumous conception”.
The Capatos married in 1999, and Robert was diagnosed with oesophegal cancer shortly afterwards. For fear that treatment might render him sterile, the Capatos began depositing sperm at a Florida sperm bank. They had a naturally conceived son in 2001, but they grew increasingly worried as Robert’s condition worsened. They signed a notarised statement that any children “born to us, who were conceived by the use of our embryos” shall be in all aspects their children and entitled to their property.
However, this clause was not included in Robert Capato’s will and Social Security survivor benefits were denied to the twins. Apart from reconciling Federal and State law, the case shows how many…
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A British woman who had a child by surrogacy has sued for paid maternity leave. The woman, who remains anonymous, alleging sex and maternity discrimination, has taken her case to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) to decide whether the British laws are consistent with European Union directives.
The court is expected to decide later this year. Natalie Gamble, a fertility law expert, said mothers who were pregnant or who have adopted are eligible for maternity leave under the existing law, but women who use surrogates are not covered. Stuart Walne, of Surrogacy UK, said disputes over maternity leave caused “trauma”.
The woman began work as a midwife sonographer for her employer in 2001. When her baby was born in August last year, she began breastfeeding the child soon after birth, something which can be brought about through hormone treatments and drugs. ~ London Telegraph, Mar 18
A kidney transplant patient’s own stem cells could replace anti-rejection medications, a new study suggests. Six months after a kidney transplant, only around 8% of people given their own mesenchymal stem cells faced organ rejection compared with 22% of people on standard anti-rejection drugs.
“Mesenchymal stem cells are stem cells that can be differentiated into a variety of cells,” explained author of the study Dr Camillo Ricordi, of the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine. “If you infuse mesenchymal stem cells at the time of the transplant, you could replace the use of powerful anti-rejection drugs, and maybe replace immunosuppressants altogether,” he said.
Results of the study appeared in the the Journal of the American Medical Association. The technique could be used in the transplantation of islet cells (in the pancreas) for people with type 1 diabetes, and for other organ transplants, such as the liver. ~ US News, Mar 20
Abortion is back on the front pages of British papers with the news that abortion providers are routinely falsifying paperwork. The Health Secretary, Andrew Lansley, was outraged by revelations in the Telegraph, and vowed to crack down on clinics which were operating outside the law.
“I was appalled. Because if it happens, it is pretty much people engaging in a culture of both ignoring the law and trying to give themselves the right to say that although Parliament may have said this, we believe in abortion on demand.”
In the wake of revelations in February, also in the Telegraph, that some doctors were routinely approving illegal sex-selective abortions, this week the government regulator, the Care Quality Commission, raided every clinic offering abortions. Of about 250 clinics, both government-run and private, 50 were found to have falsified paperwork. Although abortion is a common procedure in Britain, it still requires the approval of two doctors. The…
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It is no secret that the Vatican and most researchers on human embryonic stem cells do not see eye to eye on much more than the time of day. So the real question is why the 
Oregon’s public health division has released 
Karen Capato gave birth to twins in 2003 – 18 months after the death of her husband, Robert Capato. Are her twins eligible for “survivor benefits”? The US Supreme Court 
A British woman who had a child by surrogacy has sued for paid maternity leave. The woman, who remains anonymous, alleging sex and maternity discrimination, has taken her case to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) to decide whether the British laws are consistent with European Union directives.
A kidney transplant patient’s own 
