The decision of the court yesterday temporarily blocking federal funding for work with human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) left researchers working with cells in limbo government lawyers decide how to react.
Judge Royce Lamberth of the US District Court for the District of Columbia issued a temporary injunction blocking the federal government to implement national current Institutes of Health (NIH) guidelines governing research with hESCs. In his 15-page ruling, Lamberth said that "ESC research necessarily depends upon the destruction of a human embryo." And because Congress each year since 1996 adopted the so-called Dickey-Wicker Amendment, which prevents Government funding "research in which a human embryo or embryos are destroyed," the government can not finance the work with cells.
the decision comes as part of a lawsuit filed a year ago by Christian groups opposed to embryo research. the US district court dismissed the complaint because it found the applicants, including some embryos listed with names, had no legal status . But in June, the Court of the United States of Washington of appeal reinstated the suit. the court ruled that two doctors on the suit, the stem cell scientists James Sherley and Theresa Deisher, do have standing because the lines NIH stem cell guidelines aggrieved by decreasing their chance of receiving funding for work on adult stem cells.
Although the prosecution was led on the rules of the Obama administration to increase funding for hESC research, Lamberth's opinion strongly suggests that funding under the Bush administration was also illegal under the Dickey Amendment.
It is unclear this morning if researchers who had received money from the grant to study hESC-a total of $ 137 million in 2010, could continue their projects. NIH referred journalists to the Ministry of Justice; a spokesman for the Department of Justice said that the department review the decision and had no further comment.
Mazzaschi Anthony, Director of Scientific Affairs of the Association of American Medical Colleges in Washington, DC, sees two options for the Obama administration to avoid the judgment of the current research. Federal lawyers could ask the appellate court to stay the injunction after a trial is held. Or they could issue a restrictive interpretation of the decision which allows continuous research to proceed and see if it is. "We need to take a deep breath and see what the plans of justice are," said Mazzaschi.
Harvard University said its researchers as NIH informed them otherwise, they could continue work on previous grants. But some scientists were taking no chances. George Daley, a researcher on stem cells at the Harvard stem cell Institute, said he had asked his lab members to keep separate any work with the hESC materials purchased with NIH money. "I read the decision, and I would be surprised if someone else can find a way to interpret this as nothing less than a general ban on the use of federal funds for research on human ES cells, "he said.
If the injunction holds the only way for federal funding of hESC research could continue is if Congress passes a law replacing the Dickey Amendment. Representative Diana DeGette (D-CO), co-sponsor of a bill to codify Obama stem cell policy, issued a statement calling the decision "deeply disappointing" and saying that "we have to pass sensible legislation seeking embryonic stem cells. " As an alternative to a stand-alone bill, Congress could add an amendment to a current bill ending the Dickey-Wicker rule.
But Mazzaschi said he is certain that legislators will want to take the legislation on stem cells during the "madness" of a year midterm elections when many Democrats and Republican moderates are vulnerable.
Science Insider will relay updates on the consequences of the injunction.
For more information on the prohibition of stem cells, see our full coverage.
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