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Embryonic Stem Cell Research Argumentative Essay

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Improved technologies in science and health has led to the elongation of human life. Even with this progress, there are still illnesses and injuries that cannot be treated. The use of stem cells to treat patients is a relatively new, but promising, area of science. Although there are several types of stem cells, most people think of embryonic stem cells when discussing stem cell research. While this cell type has shown the most potential, it brings up ethical dilemmas. Negative opinions associated with stem cell research due to embryonic stem cells hinder prospective studies. Stem cell research offers potential therapies, but the procurement of embryos and the destruction of the embryo to isolate embryonic stem cells leads to problems with …show more content…

The first step towards embryonic stem cell research is obtaining the embryos. Currently, most embryos used in stem cell research are spare embryos from In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) treatment (de Wert & Mummery, 2003). This is because using the embryos for research is a better option than discarding them as medical waste. Besides donating or destroying the embryos, couples can also opt to let other couples adopt the embryos or continue to store them, which can get expensive (Fischbach & Fischbach, 2004). Along with treating infertility, the embryos are used for researching potential therapies. While donating embryos to research avoids the wasting of embryos, there are concerns about the quality of spare embryos. Embryos with the highest chance of resulting in a pregnancy will be chosen for the IVF treatment, potentially leaving less durable embryos as spares (de Wert & Mummery, 2003). This leads to researchers preferring to generate new embryos and embryonic cell lines for their own studies. While using spare embryos to further our knowledge in health and science is approved of, knowingly creating an embryo with the intention of destroying it, even for research, is

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