Stem-Cell Signal
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
The decision of New Jersey voters Tuesday to reject overwhelmingly Governor Corzine’s proposal to borrow $450 million to spend on stem cell research will have consequences that reach beyond the Garden State. Here in New York, Governor Spitzer has proposed borrowing nearly $2 billion for the same purpose. It’d be a fine time to use the New Jersey results as a reason to rethink the wisdom of the idea and save New Yorkers the trouble of rejecting our own ballot initiative.
For one thing, if stem cell research is as medically promising as its advocates claim, there are vast pools of private venture and philanthropic capital available to fund it. The big pharmaceutical companies have their own research and development operations and laboratories. The federal government, while refusing, under President Bush, to fund research on new lines of embryonic stem cells, has devoted billions of dollars to research on adult stem cells, stem cells derived from umbilical cord blood, and preexisting lines of embryonic stem cells.
New research suggests that mouse cells may be “reprogrammed” to act like embryonic stem cells, or that cells taken from amniotic fluid may function like embryonic stem cells. The director of the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke at the National Institutes of Health, Story Landis, testified before Congress in January that “since 2001, NIH has invested nearly $3 billion on all forms of stem cell research.” On top of that, Mr. Landis testified that in fiscal year 2007, “it is projected that NIH will spend more than $30 million on human embryonic stem cell research and about $200 million on human non-embryonic stem cell research, while also investing nearly $100 million on nonhuman embryonic stem cell research and more than $270 million on nonhuman non-embryonic stem cell research.”
In the face of all that, it’s easy to understand why the voters of New Jersey voted not to go into debt to pay for more research on the backs of state taxpayers. In July, Mr. Spitzer announced a panel to distribute $600 million in New York State funding for stem cell research — without going to the voters for approval of a bond issue. With the state facing a multi-billiondollar budget gap, Wall Street in the most perilous state in years, and New Yorkers already groaning under one of the nation’s highest state and local tax burdens, that’s more than enough.