International court makes pro-life ruling
by Charlie Butts
The European Union’s top court has ruled that patents cannot be granted on stem-cell techniques using human embryos.
While the decision is being heralded by pro-life and religious groups, Dr. David Prentice of Family Research Council says it doesn’t ban research on embryos or embryonic stem cells, but it does take away a lot of the incentive.
“In fact one of the things that the court said was you can’t profit from using human embryos for experiments and you can’t profit from killing embryos, even if somebody else killed them,” says Prentice. “So, our hope is that scientists are going to be encouraged to work with ethical, successful adult stem cells.”
Prentice was asked why patents should be forbidden for human embryos and the research on them.
“It’s another human being,” says the doctor. “This is a whole new example of modern-day slavery–of creating, destroying, owning, patenting other human beings even if they are early in human life.”
In the United States, a person cannot patent a human embryo. Prentice applauds the European court’s decision and says they are ahead of the U.S. in patenting laws, at least for now.
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