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Irish bioethics council axed

Nature Biotechnology volume 28, page 112 (2010)Cite this article

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An Erratum to this article was published on 01 June 2010

This article has been updated

Stem cell research in Ireland has been thrown into a state of confusion, after a recent government decision to cut all funding for the Irish Council for bioethics at the end of the year. Paradoxically, the move coincides with a recent Supreme Court decision that removes some of the legal uncertainties surrounding human embryonic stem cell research in the country. The judges denied a woman the right to proceed with in vitro fertilization without the consent of her estranged husband. In doing so, the court ruled that embryos outside the womb are not protected by the country's constitutional protection of the unborn. Although this ruling affects human embryonic stem cell (hESC) research by providing clarification on the status of pre-implanted embryos, scientists remain wary of proceeding until a supporting framework is in place. “I'm going to behave responsibly. It's going to be done by the book,” says Tom Moore at University College Cork (UCC), who has already received clearance to carry out hESC research from UCC's research ethics committee. Ireland has no laws governing human stem cell research and scientists have been operating in a legal limbo. “The lack of an independent bioethics board will have serious repercussions for how Ireland is seen as a hub for medical research, and that will have to be addressed as a matter of urgency,” says scientific director Stephen Sullivan of the newly formed Irish Stem Cell Foundation, which is calling on the government to reinstate the council.

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Change history

  • 07 June 2010

    In the version of this article initially published, a researcher at University College Cork was incorrectly named. His name is Tom (not Barry) Moore. The error has been corrected in the HTML and PDF versions of the article.

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  1. Cormac Sheridan
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Sheridan, C. Irish bioethics council axed. Nat Biotechnol 28, 112 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/nbt0210-112a

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