Madam, - However much your cartoonist may seek to trivialise the issue (The Irish Times, November 27th), the use of human embryos as raw material for scientific research is a profoundly serious ethical problem and is acknowledged as such by most specialists in the field.
The recent attention given by our national and European political representatives to this issue is appropriate and welcome. Unfortunately, however, it has come rather late in the day.
A Council of Ministers decision taken on September 30th 2002 (No. 834) approved a specific programme of €12.9 billion for research funding, including €1.1 billion for "advanced genomics" research. That decision prohibited, inter alia, "research activities intended to create human embryos solely for the purpose of research or for the purpose of stem cell procurement".
It also stated that "an ethical review will be implemented systematically by the Commission for proposals dealing with ethically sensitive issues, in particular proposals involving the use of human embryos and human embryonic stem cells. Any research project involving the use of human embryos and human embryonic stem cells, following the ethical review mentioned above, will be submitted to a Regulatory Committee."
A moratorium until December 31st, 2003 on the funding of research on human embryos was also agreed, to allow time for more detailed rules for such research to be prepared.
The proposed decision on these detailed rules has sparked the current controversy. The Commission proposal is to fund research on "spare" human embryos produced for IVF purposes before June 27th, 2002, whereas the Parliament wants to permit research on future "spare" embryos up to 14 days old. The solution now proposed by the Portuguese representative would restrict funding to research on material which had already been derived from human embryos before the new decision to release these funds.
As is obvious from the above, the real problem arose when decision 834 was being considered last year. No "moratorium", "ethical review" or "Regulatory Committee" can alter the fact that the funding of research "involving the use of human embryos and human embryonic stem cells" was implicitly approved in that decision by the representatives of the member states.
A truly ethical approach - which would be in accordance with the EU commitment to the inviolability of human dignity proclaimed in Article 1 of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights - would be to set aside the unfortunate concession implied in the earlier Council decision. If the Finance Ministers can decide to undermine the European Monetary System by waiving the Stability Pact rules to avoid offending France and Germany, it would be a small matter for the Competition Ministers to amend Council Decision 834 to exclude all research on human embryos.
Perhaps the real lesson to be learned from this episode is that "vigilance is the price of freedom". It behoves all who care about ethical issues in public life to follow such matters more closely and to address these problems before they become so intractable. - Yours, etc.
BRENDAN O'CONNOR, Knapton Road, Monkstown, Co Dublin.