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International
Right to Life Federation, Inc.
Vol.
15 No. 1
(January/ February 2004)
Korea-Human Embryo Cloned Then Killed
According to reliable reports, the Korea Stem Cell
Research Center has succeeded in cloning a human embryo,
thus creating a new human life. They collected 242
human ova, extracted their nuclei and inserted male
nuclei from other cells. They report having a 43%
success rate in beginning to grow to the blastocyst
stage (four days old), living human embryos. At the
four-day-old stage, they directly killed these tiny
new human beings, cutting each open and extracting
embryonic stem cells from their interior. In only
one case did a colony of stem cells begin to grow
independently. According to the lead author, Woo Suk
Hwang, these embryonic stem cells grew and subdivided
for 70 divisions at which time it was possible to
detect that they were forming muscle, bone and other
tissue. (See Associated Press, 2-13-03)
EU Opposes Funding Embryonic Stem Cells
In December, European Union ministers could not reach
an agreement on this issue. Accordingly, there will
be no funding from the EU for destructive embryonic
stem cell research, at least for now.
Patenting Human Beings Prohibited
The U.S. Congress has passed a law that will prohibit
the patenting of human beings. Currently the U.S.
patent office enforces a similar policy. It has continued
to reject requests from biotech firms or research
universities to patent a human being. This would include
genetically engineered human embryos but would not
prohibit patents on tissues cells or other biologic
products. "The biotech industry," said Congress
Weldon (a pro-life physician), "has been fighting
this." They have been lobbying to keep the legal
door open for patenting cloned or genetically modified
human embryos to ensure the payment of royalties for
each embryo created or sold under license. Such things
are essential for making human embryo farms and fetus
farms profitable.
Italy-Final Vote Against Cloning
The Italian Parliament voted a third and final time
to pass legislation that will regulate Assisted Reproductive
Technology (ART), which has been unregulated in the
country for several years, BBC News reports (BBC News,
12/11). The Italian House approved the measure in
June 2002. It would ban couples from using donated
sperm or eggs for ART, deny single women access to
ART and permit doctors to conscientiously object to
involvement in the ART process. The proposed law would
limit ART to sterile heterosexual coupes who are married
or who live together, effectively prohibiting same-sex
couples, single women and women beyond childbearing
age from using ART. The measure would prohibit the
use of prenatal screening for abnormalities or genetic
disorders, even for couples with a history of genetic
disease. The measure would also limit to three the
number of eggs that could be harvested and fertilized
at any one time and would require that all three eggs
be implanted at the same time. In addition, women
cannot refuse implantation after eggs have already
been fertilized. The bill also bans doctors from freezing
embryos and from using them in scientific research.
Existing frozen embryos, of which there are about
24,000 in the country, would be put up for "adoption,"
and frozen embryo depositories would be closed. The
bill would impose punishments on violators, including
jail terms. In addition, doctors found using donated
sperms or eggs could be fined. The bill now goes back
to the House for final approval.
E.U. Forbids Sale of Human Tissue
In mid December, the European Parliament approved
a new rule forbidding the sale, for profit, of human
eggs, sperm and other tissue. It does not forbid the
sale of blood, embryonic stem cells or other organs.
The "sale" cannot involve a profit but can
cover the cost of expenses.
UNESCO Retreats-Good News
Mr. Austin Ruse of the UN C-FAM organization, in
October, issued a report noted in our last newsletter,
that UNESCO was deeply involved in the promotion of
abortion. This caused considerable turbulence. In
January, Tommy Thompson, U.S. Secretary of Health
and Human Services, wrote an official letter to UNESCO's
director general, Koichiro Matsura, indicating the
United States' extreme displeasure with some UNESCO
documents. He named "Unwanted Pregnancy and Unsafe
Abortion," which had been named by C-FAM above
and had been published in 2002 by UNESCO's Bangkok
office. It recommended abortion for all women and
girls without restriction, the public financing of
abortion, as well as the removal of all parental notification
and consent laws. In response to Secretary Thompson,
Mr. Matsura admitted that the material "is not
in line with our polices or mandate." Following
this he "instructed the Bangkok office to withdraw
the document and remove it from the Internet."
This
was done. Furthermore, he sent Thompson a memo,
copies to all UNESCO deputies, stating, "My attention
has been drawn to certain co-publications that could
give the impression that UNESCO has a mandate or that
it issues recommendations in the area of abortion.
I therefore wish to recall to your attention that
abortion and abortion related issues do not come within
the mandate of UNESCO. UNESCO does not promote abortions
and no funds are given by member states to be spent
on abortion related activities or materials. I ask
you to ensure that UNESCO's policy in this area is
not misrepresented, in particular through publications
and co-publications."
This is a dramatic turn around of this major worldwide
organization. We welcome it. We also alert our pro-life
friends worldwide, to be quick to report any branch
of UNESCO that does not follow this quite specific
instruction.
Two More Women Dead From RU 486
In Britain a public health official, responding to
a question, has stated that the committee on safety
of medicines has information about two women who died
following use of the abortion drug. This adds to the
two Canadian women who died over a year ago and the
more recent death in a California case. Speaking for
the British pro-life group, LIFE, Nuala Scarisbrick
stated, "If these women had not taken RU 486,
they would probably be alive today and so would their
babies. There is such a conspiracy of silence about
the after affects of abortion that LIFE is sure there
are other deaths that have not been reported.
Fetal Homicide Law Passes in France
The lower house of Parliament in France approved a
measure criminalizing the killing of an unborn child
as a result of killing or injuring the pregnant mother
during an assault or in an automobile accident.
Halifax Abortion Chamber Closes
The notorious abortionist, Henry Morgantaller, opened
an abortion chamber in Halifax, Canada, 13 years ago.
It was his first. It is closing but report has it
that its abortions will now be done by the Victoria
General Hospital in Halifax.
Two Nations Forbid Abortions
Most of our readers are fully aware of the remarkable
record of Poland, where the number of abortions, under
their new protective law, has declined from around
150,000 per year to less than 200. Recognition should
also be given to tiny El Salvador in Central America.
To your editor's knowledge, these are the only two
countries that have turned laws back in a direction
of life. El Salvador legally forbade abortion in 1999.
Their constitution mandates that human life is protected
"from the moment of conception."
But UNICEF is a Poisoned Well
A recent essay in the British medical journal Lancet
exposed the aggressive pro-abortion policies of UNICEF.
It noted that of the world's ten million children
who died last year of preventable diseases and starvation,
two-thirds could have been saved by effective international
intervention through UNICEF. It pleaded that "child
survival must be put back on the agenda." This
organization has gone from bad to worse. The turnaround
occurred when the Clinton administration demanded
the appointment of Carol Bellamy as its director.
She decided its job was not to save sick and hungry
children, but to join the great march toward universal
sex freedom-advocating for minor's access to condoms,
requiring that refugee camps provide abortion services,
handing out sex education manuals to grade school
children in the third world… All of this to achieve
the ability of any woman, in any place, at any price,
for any reason, to have an abortion.
We recently reported on the exposure of abortion strategy
memos a few months ago. These noted that the abortion
strategy was to insert vague passages in as many international
treaties, reports and working papers as possible and
then getting the enforcement agencies and entities,
such as the European Court of Human Rights, to interpret
these passages to mean a universal right to abortion
has been established.
When Mr. Ruse's C-FAM exposed these letters, he
was immediately confronted with a legal demand to
totally suppress what he had discovered. Instead he
gave them to U.S. Congressman, Chris Smith, who entered
the entire piece in the U.S. Congressional Record,
thereby insulating it from any further attempt to
suppress it.
There seems to be no limit to any and all of their
efforts to promote abortion. In a perceptive analysis,
in the February 2 edition of the Weekly Standard,
its editorial detailed a number of "examples
of their fanaticism." It noted that the UN backed
European Population Forum has blamed the U.S. for
bringing "near collapse to international gatherings
on children's rights, development and population by
opposing any language that might allow for abortion."
You see, the president of International Planned Parenthood
explained that the fundamental job of every international
agency, in coming years, will be to fight the opponents
of abortion by "discrediting their pseudo science
and unmasking their ideological motives. It is essential,"
he said, "to demonstrate the truly dangerous
consequences of their anti-abortion approach."
So, while we are seeing the beginning of some rational
clean up of UNESCO, would that it could also happen
in UNICEF.
More UN World Government
The UN Human Rights Commission has ordered Australia
to pay a military pension to the homosexual partner
of a deceased war veteran (Edward Young). The government
had previously denied the claim, but the UN Commission
overruled it based on Article 26 of the International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. This article
deals with equality rights but does not specifically
include sexual orientation. So, the UN again has impinged
on the sovereignty of the Australian government, ordering
an action by it based on a "right" that
would seem to be evident only to the UN bureaucrats.
What Is "Vegetative State"?
The American Academy of Neurology defines persistent
vegetative state in the following way: "Patients
in PVS have sleep, wake cycles but remain completely
unaware of themselves or their environments and are
incapable of any kind of voluntary movement. They
do not have the capacity to experience pain or suffering.
Pain and suffering are attributes of consciousness
requiring cerebral cortical functioning and patients
who are permanently and completely unconscious cannot
experience these symptoms." The academy recommends
carefully observing patients for one to three months
along with laboratory studies before declaring a patient
to be in persistent vegetative state.
Population Crash
The seriousness of the impending demographic crisis
was explicitly demonstrated by the projections just
published by the UN Population Division. Its low variant
projection, historically the most accurate, predicts
that world population will peak in 2040 at 7.5 billion
people. Today's population is 6.3 billion. Further,
its special long-range projections show a downward
population spiral so that by 2300 the world will harbor
only 2.3 billion people and it will resemble old Europe
of today, graying, aged and dying.
The UN Population Division's median variant, which
has been getting most of the press coverage, but which
has not been accurate in the last few decades, calls
for a population peak of 9 billion in 2100 and then
stability thereafter. They premise this on the unrealistic
assumption that fertility rates worldwide will bottom
out at 1.85 children per women. Europe today is 1.35
and continuing to drop. No concrete evidence is given
for the median projection population stopping at 1.85.
Certainly there would be no sign of Europe's climbing
from today's 1.35 back up to 1.85. In any case, those
are the numbers today.
India-We Really Mean Only Two Kids
The Supreme Court of India has ruled that legal curbs
designed to punish large families do not violate that
nation's fundamental personal rights. This in response
to legislation in the Haryana State, that ruled that
parents of more than two children were ineligible
to run for political office. Reports are that the
federal government is prepared to extend the two child
norm nation wide.
Italy Needs Babies
To combat Italy's disastrous low birthrate, the Italian
government has announced that it will give 1,200 USD
to couples with at least one child who have an additional
child during the year of 2004. Italy's birthrate is
1.2, which, with Spain, are the lowest in the world
with the possible exception of Romania and Russia.
Embryonic Stem Cells
The Nature biology journal, reporting on research
at the Universities of Sheffield and Wisconsin, report
that this research suggests that human embryonic stem
cells, after being grown in a laboratory, have been
found to develop genetic abnormalities that were not
there when they were first cultured. This is one to
watch closely.
Meanwhile, Adult Stem Cells Work
Noting the claims of human cloning in South Korea
and their further claims of the potential success
that may be achieved by using embryonic stem cells,
we're pleased to bring a recent report from Duke University.
It has concluded studies showing that adult stem cells
from umbilical cord blood can rebuild damaged heart
tissue. There had been evidence that such adult stem
cells could help heart tissue. But this new study
shows "convincing clinical evidence" that
these stem cells are actually "differentiating
themselves into brain, heart, liver and bone cells."
The director of this program, Joanne Kurtzberg said,
"Now we have examined heart tissue on a cellular
level and have proven that these donor cells are not
only present in heart tissue but they have become
heart muscle cells." So, here we have another
example of therapeutic cures proven from adult stem
cells. Note that to date there have been no cures
from embryonic stem cells.
Japan-Schools Closing
According to the January 2004 issue of Asia Pacific
Perspectives, over 2,000 public schools in Japan have
closed in the last decade. "Demand for school
places has fallen as the birthrate declines…"
Further, "The birthrate is expected to continue
its decline and a number of schools closing down will
increase accordingly." This in an article by
Shinichi Okada.
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