Stem Cells May Be on Missouri Ballot

Stem Cells May Be on Missouri Ballot

The St. Louis Business Journal reported that the Missouri Coalition for Lifesaving Cures is trying to get a measure on the Missouri November 2006 ballot to prevent the state from banning any research or cures that is allowed by federal law. It would be the first measure in the country to “give patients the rights to have diseases or injuries treated with stem-cell cures allowed by federal law, including those involving adult stem cells, and early, or embryonic, stem cells from the Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer process and from leftover fertility clinic embryos that would otherwise be discarded.” It would create guidelines for research and would ban human reproductive cloning.

According to the article, the measure is supported by both Democrats and Republicans, and is a response to previous attempts to make stem-cell treatments a felony.

An AP Wire story on the subject printed by the Kansas City Star reports that the central issue of the measure is the SCNT process, also known as therapeutic cloning. The bill’s protection of patients' treatment with stem cells derived from human embryo cells is opposed by various religious and right-to-life groups.