Bloomberg: The Case for Fetal-Tissue Research Is Overwhelming
Editorial Board

“…It’s no exaggeration to say hundreds of millions of people have benefited from vaccines derived from fetal tissue. … The [Trump] administration has announced that government scientists will no longer conduct fetal-tissue research, and that scientists supported by federal funds will face extra scrutiny and require case-by-case approval. … The director of the NIH has stressed the scientific value of fetal-tissue research. Some 70 medical organizations and universities submitted a letter to the government arguing that ‘fetal tissue research cannot be replaced with existing alternative research models’ and that restricting it would be ‘devastating to patients.’ … Opponents of such research doubtless value life-saving vaccines and better treatments for disease: They want to stop the work because they object to abortion. Yet stopping fetal-tissue research would do nothing to reduce abortions, which number in the hundreds of thousands annually for reasons that have nothing to do with biomedical research. Blocking this research will hold back medical science, at great cost to human well-being, for no intelligible purpose. In pressing this case, advocates need to be as assertive and persistent as their opponents — and when they speak up, they need allies to rally opinion to their side” (6/9).