Introduction:
Stem cell research has offered a new viable therapeutic option for debilitating diseases, injuries and other diseased conditions. The scope of stem cell based treatment has expanded in recent years due to advances in stem cell research and technologies. Now, stem cell based treatments have been established as standard clinical care in certain disorders like use of hematopoietic stem cells in leukemia’s or use of limbal stem cells in corneal disorder.
Stem cell technology is speedily increasing within the field of regenerative medicine, granting DE novo production of functional tissue and providing for brand new diagnostic and therapeutic capabilities that will surpass the risk benefit ratio of typical existing reparative treatment modalities e.g. organ transplantation, rejuvenation of tissues. [1] The hype created by this discovery and so claimed by many research scientists has made people believe that something significant is happening.
Whatever promising future clinical application it holds, stem cell research especially embryonic stem cell research is associated with ethical, social and legal controversies.
What is so unethical about embryonic stem cell research? The major conflicting unethical issue identified with this research is extraction of embryonic stem cells by embryo destruction. The very embryo which has the capacity to become a human being is destroyed at the onset of its potentiality of becoming one of us. The current view about any clinical research is to look it from the view point of cardinal research principles of autonomy, justice, non- malfeasance and human dignity.
Any research which stands to violate these principles is bound to suffer from moral and ethical controversies. A research that involves embryo destruction will find it difficult to accommodate itself within these cardinal principles.