Investigators in the Ukraine are probing whether missing infants and preborns taken from mothers by maternity staff at a Kharkov hospital were killed so their organs could be extracted for stem-cell experimentation.
A few months ago, Family News in Focus reported that women in the Ukraine were being paid about $200 at a time to have abortions in order to provide stem cells for beauty treatments. Now more grisly findings are being reported. The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) said it has video of 30 infants and fetuses being exhumed from a cemetery used by a maternity hospital in the Ukraine. Some of the bodies are missing organs.
Dr. Janice Crouse, director of the Beverly LaHaye Institute at Concerned Women for America, said one theory is that the children were killed to obtain bone marrow for embryonic stem-cell research.
"One of the things that we have been concerned about for years is the fact that, by pushing embryonic stem-cell research, we're looking at a situation that is bound to use human beings as fodder for the experiments," she told Family News in Focus.
That "fodder" will be substantial. Hundreds of millions of eggs and stem-cells will be needed, and bioethicist Wesley Smith is convinced the demand will lead to fetal farming.
"In order to get the millions and millions of eggs that would be required, poor women in Bangladesh, in Congo, in other destitute nations would be seen by biotechnologists as so many egg farms ripe for the harvest," Smith said.
Harvesting eggs -- and stem-cells -- is dangerous business, sometimes resulting in sterility, infection and even death.
"The entire concept of the human being as a product is coming into vogue," he said, "and it should be a great concern to everyone."
Smith said we may already be entering into a new form of slavery, where the poorest of humans and the disabled are seen merely as animals to be exploited or crops to be harvested.
The video footage has been turned over to the Council of Europe for investigation. Many fear this could be the start of a new, gruesome chapter in the stem-cell debate.
FOR MORE INFORMATION
For a closer look at the brave new world of embryonic stem-cell research, we recommend, Dawn Vargo's article, "What the Media Won't Tell You About Stem-Cell Research," on the Focus on Social Issues Web site.
