How Can Anyone Still Support Embryonic Stem Cell Research?

Frozen embryo survives Katrina flood: Noah is born

Reuters | Friday, 19 January 2007

WASHINGTON: A baby boy who as a frozen embryo was saved from the flood spawned by Hurricane Katrina in 2005 has been born in a hospital in the New Orleans area and named for Noah, who safely navigated the biblical flood.

Noah Benton Markham was born on Tuesday in St Tammany Parish Hospital in Covington, Louisiana, a hospital spokeswoman said on Wednesday. He weighed 8 pounds, 6½ ounces (3.8 kg), and was delivered by Caesarean section with no complications, the spokeswoman said.

His parents, Rebekah and Glen Markham, were unable to have children and created embryos at a fertility clinic to be implanted in the mother's womb.

After the hurricane, authorities saved his embryo and others stored at a hospital where they had been in danger of thawing amid the flood engulfing the area.

Baby Noah has a 2-year-old brother whose embryo was created at the same time but was implanted earlier.

Embryonic stem cell research truly is murder. Every time a human embryo is used in the cause of science another Noah Markham is denied his right to life. Besides after twenty years of intense research, no positive results have come from the destruction of human embryos. Congressional debates over embryonic stemm cell research aren't simply debates over ethics. They are debates over whether the government will fund a form of research, that has never been proven to work, and simultaneously denies thousands the ability to see the light of day.

I'm disgusted that our congress wants to encourage such destructive research. Many blessings on young Noah, and his elated family.