A state senator who says the state is turning its back on research that could cure human diseases sees a climate of political fear at the Capitol and suggests people will die before lawmakers overcome it.
Senator Chuck Graham of Columbia wonders what happened to a governor and lawmakers who stood up to anti-stem cell interests just two years ago and wonders how the governor’s suggestion in January that the state’s Life Sciences Research board get money for for human medical research could become an appropriation only for plant and animal research.
Graham’s effort to include human disease research in the authorization has been strongly voted down. He thinks too many lawmakers are influenced too heavily by pressure from anti-stem cell interests. He says political fear must be dealt with by state lawmakers.
Graham says the governor supported amendment two last year…and advocated life science research in his State of the State message and even included it in his original Lewis and Clark initiative proposal. Graham wonders why everything seems to have changed. He says passage of the spending bill for the Life Sciences Research Board shows the state places a greater value on pigs than on people.