Johnny Isakson: “We can't. We are not scientists. Mr. Coburn certainly would qualify as a medical doctor, but there are no scientists…”

“We can't. We are not scientists. Mr. Coburn certainly would qualify as a medical doctor, but there are no scientists here of the eminence of people doing this critical work. Ms. Collins made a very good point, and the point I would like to reiterate from the presentation I made this morning is that there is nobody here arguing against furthering science and furthering embryonic stem cell research. The question is which route we take. The proposal in S. 30, which Senator Coleman and myself have brought forward, is an affirmation of the need to expand embryonic stem cell research. It is an affirmation that there is a way to do it. In the course of the last couple of years, we have discovered a lot of new, interesting, and dynamic things, most important of which is that 5 of the 21 lines that exist right now, under the grandfather clause the President issued in August of 2001, are lines derived not from the destruction of a live embryo or an implantable embryo but from a naturally dead embryo.”