The belief that turning human beings into valuable commodities in which the carcasses of the helpless are used to improve the lives of the more powerful is the debate at which we stand.
“Using federal funds to support pluripotent stem cell research guarantees proper ethical oversight and public input into this important work” (Ojeda 108)Stem cell research could be considered unethical because tiny fetuses are being used. There are stories of how people who have Parkinson’s disease are helpless and considered a vegetable and were eventually helped dramatically because millions of stem cells that were from the 60 stem cells available to use, were placed in their brain and significant improvements were recorded. The problem is that the stem cells had to have come from someone not something. They came from fetuses that didn’t willingly give up their brains because they were not able to. This argument could go on and on but the best way to put it is quoted in Ojeda’s book where it says, “ Great benefits do not justify unethical means” (113). That sums up the whole argument. Some say that taking embryos will not be the boundary for this research but eventually taking aborted human babies will become resources. No one knows how far people will go to obtain benefits for those who are fortunate enough to be alive.
“The entire purpose of the embryonic stem cell controversy has been to advance a new collectivist medical ethic in which the rights of the individual can be violated in the name of society’s greater good” (Egendorf 133). Common sense would suggest that we are entitled to do what nature does all the time. If waiting on someone to die to get an organ for transplant is ethical then the same principle applies to stem cell research.
http://www.oocities.org/rwillis11
http://bioethics.gov/background/outkapaper.html
Ojeda, Auriana. Technology and Society. Bonnie Szumski. San Diego: Greenhaven.
2002.
Egendorf, Laura K. Medicine: Opposing Viewpoints. Bonnie Szumski. San Diego:
Greenhaven, 2003.