IN DEFIANCE of the Bush administration, stem cell research could get a big boost in California from an initiative by scientists and patient-advocacy groups. They propose the state should raise $3 billion to fund stem cell research, and Californians will vote on the measure in November, during the presidential elections.
Federal funds can only be used to conduct research on about 60 embryonic stem-cell lines created before August 2001. 鈥淭he reality is that many of these lines petered out, or never grew, or were not normal,鈥� says Evan Snyder at the Burnham Institute in La Jolla, California. 鈥淭his is not the way science should be done.鈥�
California has challenged the Bush government over the past two years by passing a law that makes it clear scientists can harvest stem cells from embryos donated at fertility clinics, and established the US鈥檚 first state-wide registry to locate such embryos. Last month, New Jersey became the only other US state to pass such a law.
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California hopes to go one step further by injecting state money into stem cell research. 鈥淲hat the California proposition intends to do is to put some teeth into this policy,鈥� says Snyder.