Court’s stem cell ruling casts dark cloud on research future

BioWorld: “Had Congress intended to limit Dickey-Wicker to only discrete acts that result in the destruction of an embryo, like the derivation of hESCs, or to research on the embryo itself, lawmakers could have written the statute that way, but they didn’t, the judge wrote in his ruling, stating that the court was ‘bound to apply the law as it is written.’ If one step or piece of research of an hESC research project results in the destruction of an embryo, ‘the entire project is precluded from receiving federal funding by the Dickey-Wicker Amendment,’ the judge said.”