Political Quotes

“I am glad the gentlewoman talked about the need for ethical medical research because one of our panel's accomplishments is to show how StemExpress undermined the very foundations of ethical American scientific research. First, Federal regulations require researchers to obtain informed consent from each person used as a subject. The basic element of informed consent includes a detailed explanation of the purposes of the research for which tissue is being obtained. StemExpress, as we found, simply did not follow that requirement. HHS regulations also require that in obtaining consent, researchers ``minimize the possibility of coercion or undue influence.'' Well, StemExpress documents that we uncovered shows that its employees were already promising to deliver baby body parts even before the abortions were performed. That raises serious concerns that there may have been coercion or undue influence on women to donate parts of their aborted babies. Now, second, Federal regulations require that all research that involves human subjects needs approval from an institutional review board, or IRB. As a medical researcher, I had to file IRB applications and receive IRB approval from my university's IRB.…”