Korea¡¯s already battered biotech industry faces a fresh challenge from women¡¯s rights activists angry at what they see as a high-handed approach to occyte procurement for cloning and other embryonic research. Some 30 women¡¯s rights groups including Korea Women's Associations United (KWAU) on Wednesday urged authorities to investigate egg cell procurement for experiments by the disgraced cloning researcher Hwang Woo-suk. The groups made the call in a press conference at the Seoul Press Center.
 |
|
Representatives of 35 women's organizations including Korean Womenlink call for an investigation into the ethics of use of ova in stem cell research by disgraced cloning Prof. Hwang Woo-suk¡¯s team, at the Press Center in Seoul on Wednesday morning./Yonhap
|
 |
|
The activists said the government was so dazzled by the profits it expected stem cell technology to net the nation that it became blind to the danger to women¡¯s life and health from donating eggs. They said there was an urgent need to discover how many eggs from how many donors were used in Hwang¡¯s experiments, what motivated the donors, how the eggs were extracted, and what institutions were involved. They also called for an investigation of whether two junior researchers in Hwang¡¯s team were pressured to donate their own eggs, and demanded that the government compensate donors for any damage to their health from the extraction process.
A Seoul National University panel probing the scientific validity of Hwang¡¯s research, however, takes the view that the ethics of occyte procurement are beyond the scope of its own investigation. In a press briefing on the same day, the panel said suspicions about the egg procurement process were a separate issue from the accuracy of Hwang¡¯s published research data it is looking into.
The women¡¯s groups slammed the government for its failure to establish how many eggs were used for stem cell research by Hwang¡¯s team and a fertility clinic that cooperated with him since a new bioethics law took effect in January last year.
The groups said patients at fertility clinics had no way of discovering if their leftover eggs are used for other purposes once their treatment ends, and castigated the Ministry of Health and Welfare and related agencies for failing to strictly control the process.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
|
