The UK Leads in Addressing the Korean Stem Cell Fallout

The Register reports, just as we had hoped, that in the wake of this unfolding international debacle about who knew what about whatver actually happened in Korea, scientists are beginning to consider self-regulation aimed at ensuring as a matter of "peer pressure" that stem cell researchers work on the development and pressure for enforcement of research ethics guidelines in stem cell research but in particular "the sourcing of human eggs for use in research." In the piece, entitled "Stem cell researchers want watchdogs for human tests," none of the UK scientists involved are quoted but I can tell you that yesterday morning we held a conference call with three scientists in UK labs that work with stem cells to discuss a call to the international stem cell organization for leadership on the matter.

Note on What is Coming Up on the Korean Matter in the Pages of AJOB and at bioethics.net:

Upcoming in The American Journal of Bioethics is a special article by the leaders who worked with the Hwang group on the development of ethics guidelines for egg procurement, who defends their efforts, and alongside will be a commentary on the article by Mildred Cho and David Magnus of Stanford. Those will be released early next week under embargo and by the end of next week as free-to-the-public In Focus Articles. The former piece is also part of a special issue on international issues in bioethics sponsored by Case Western Reserve University's Department of Bioethics and edited by Mark Aulisio.

I'm on the way to the UK so while I am going to try to keep up I can guarantee it will be slow blogging until Monday. So maybe it might be fun if you have a minute to check out some of the links on the right - several new blogs listed and we have updated our journals links as well. -gm