US PRESIDENT OBAMA recently signed an executive order to lift the Bush administration's restrictions on federally financed human embryonic stem cell research. This decision provides Congress with an opportunity to overturn a thirteen-year-old law, known as the Dickey-Wicker amendment, which specifically bans the use of tax dollars for research in which human embryos are destroyed, discarded, or knowingly subjected to risk of injury.
A number of medical companies and institutions have applauded the decision, including the International Stem Cell Corporation (ISCO).
 "Lifting the ban of federal funding for embryonic stem cells will hugely benefit the entire stem cell industry by freeing researchers in the US to work with a full range of therapeutic options. We at International Stem Cell are particularly excited because each new treatment that is discovered using stem cells creates a new market for our company," ISCO CEO Kenneth Aldrich told The News.
"We already avoid ever destroying a fertilised embryo, so even those who opposed lifting the ban can be comfortable with the use of our cells. However, we do much more. Stem cells are a bit like organ transplants. Unless they match the patient's immune system, they will be rejected, often even if immune suppressing drugs are used. Our Parthenote cell lines can solve that problem for hundreds of millions of patients by matching their immune systems in the same way that an organ transplant does, can do anything that could otherwise be done with an embryonic cell, and create none of the issues of genetic manipulation that we believe will cloud the use of stem cells made from human tissue for years to come."
Indeed, ISCO has sucessfully developed a method of creating human stem cells from unfertilised eggs. As is noted above, "parthenogenetic" stem cells, which do not harm a viable human embryo, can be immune matched to hundreds of millions of people across the world. Since a single line of these cells may reduce immune rejection issues in large segments of the population, parthenogenetic stem cells could help treat liver and heart disease as well as mascular degeneration. The cells could also be deployed to help those suffering from diabetes, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, hemophilia and many other conditions in which cells from the patient's own body cannot be used for therapy due to a genetic defect.
"Tissue-specific differentiated cells from human stem cells open up the possibility of cell-based therapy for untreatable degenerative and heredity diseases. The greatest risk posed with these cells for transplantation is that of immune rejection," explained Dr. Elena Revazova, chief scientific officer at ISCO. "Matching donor and recipient for HLA (human leukocyte) antigens is necessary for transplant survival. ISCO already has a human parthenogenetic 'HLA homozygous' stem cell line that carries the HLA type found most commonly within the US population. Tissue-specific differentiated cells from this line can be used for cell-based therapies of hundreds of millions of patients of different ages, races and sexes."
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