The Vatican yesterday strongly condemned the "therapeutic cloning" of human embryos, research into which was recently given the green light by the governments in Britain and the US. A report by the Pontifical Academy for Life described the removal of cells from human embryos for clinical purposes as "gravely immoral" and "gravely illicit".
Therapeutic cloning is the extraction of human embryo stem cells and their reproduction for clinical purposes only.
A living human embryo, from the moment of the fusion of the gametes, is a human individual with a well defined identity and cannot be considered as a mere accumulation of cells, the report said. Signed by Dr Juan de Dios Vial Correa, the president of the academy, and his deputy, Monsignor Elio Sgreccia, the document said any interference with a fertilised embryo was a violation of the right to life.
The use of embryo stem cells in a noble cause, such as the quest for a cure for illnesses like Parkinson's Disease, does not justify the violation of the embryo's right to life, the Vatican document said. "A good cause does not turn an action that is in itself bad into a good action," it said.
British medical experts recently advised the British Prime Minister, Mr Blair, that the advantages of therapeutic cloning, which allows the farming of human cells for clinical purposes, outweighed the moral scruples involved. It is possible to use adult stem cells, taken from the blood in the placenta or from bone marrow, for similar purposes. But such cells are less flexible than embryo stem cells, which have an ability to develop into almost all types of tissue. And the adult cells are also more difficult to maintain for long periods.
The Vatican report said the development of adult stem cells for research purposes was the only reasonable and humane course. Mgr Sgreccia emphasised the Vatican's displeasure in an interview with Vatican Radio, saying Mr Blair's decision on the subject was a "capitulation to the pressure of businesses which want to commercialise human material". The fact that there were alternative avenues of research open made it clear that there were commercial interests at stake in this "unscrupulous use of the human being", he said.
Ms Maria Luisa Di Pietro, a researcher at the Bioethics Institute of Rome's Catholic University, said the research violated the conviction that an embryo was an individual human being, who could not be used for experimentation. "Instead they should increase research into adult stem cells or the use of cells taken from the umbilical chord," she told the Italian Catholic newspaper L'Avvenire. "Of course, using the embryos is less trouble."