Fetal tissue transplant
 
Woman gets transplant of tissue from aborted fetuses: 61-year-old Nova Scotian Canada's first recipient in experiment aimed at helping Parkinson's disease sufferers Published: The Globe and Mail December 17, 1991, pg. A.1 BY DEBORAH JONES HALIFAX -- Doctors have transplanted tissue from aborted fetuses into the brain of a 61-year-old woman with Parkinson's disease, in the first operation of its kind in Canada. The controversial operation at Halifax's Victoria General Hospital was the first of six in an experiment aimed at helping victims of the debilitating neurological disease, which affects 70,000 Canadians. At a news conference yesterday, hospital president Dr. Bernard Badley said the recipient, a Nova Scotian who does not want her name released, underwent the operation last Friday. If her recovery continues, she may go home today. Dr. Badley said the team of scientists and doctors, from Victoria General and Dalhousie University, won't know "for at least six months" whether the operation was successful. Parkinson's is caused by the brain's lack of the chemical messenger dopamine, which it requires to send signals to the body. Parkinson's sufferers no longer produce the chemical and typically lose their physical and sometimes mental abilities. Doctors believe that dopamine-producing fetal cells, selected in a laboratory from the brains of aborted fetuses and refrigerated until being injected into the recipient, continue to produce the chemical in the patient's brain. They may also encourage the patient's own brain cells to produce dopamine. Although fetal transplant research has been conducted for nearly two decades, it was just last year that researchers in Sweden reported the first clear evidence that transplants can significantly improve the condition of Parkinson's patients. Dr. Alan Fine, a Cambridge-trained scientist heading the Halifax trial, said that in the future such transplants may help patients with other neurological problems such as Alzheimer's disease or epilepsy. Research elsewhere has suggested that the transplants could be used to treat alcoholism. The procedure already is performed in several countries, including China, Cuba, Mexico, the United States and some countries in Europe. In the United States, however, there is a ban on federal funding for fetal transplant research or operations. While several U.S. institutions continue fetal transplant work with funds from other sources, some Americans pay tens of thousands of dollars to have the procedure done in places such as China. The procedure requires fetal cells because such immature tissue is not recognized and rejected by the recipient's immune system as a foreign substance. Cells from spontaneously aborted fetuses are not used because they are often diseased or deformed, and such cells could be hazardous to the recipient. Special lay and professional ethics committees formed by Victoria General and Dalhousie debated fetal transplants for nearly two years before the hospital announced in February of 1990 that it would go ahead with a trial. The first operation was orginally planned for a year ago, but was delayed because of technical and other problems, doctors said. Anti-abortion groups worldwide vehemently oppose using tissue from aborted fetuses in such treatments. Some have charged it will lead to the "harvesting of fetuses" or the use of women in the Third World as "fetus factories." Dr. Badley said the hospital considers the issue of abortion entirely separate from the medical use of fetal tissue. "It is purposefully confused (by anti-abortion groups), I think, in order to make a point," he said yesterday. "There's an analogy in that I don't condone murder, but if someone is shot through the head and their organs are available . . . I see no reason not to use them," Dr. Badley said last year when the trial was announced. Tricia Chute of the anti-abortion Council for Life said the Nova Scotia group is disappointed about the transplant operation. "We do not support this kind of thing, based on the fact this is abortion we're talking about." When the experiment was announced, anti-abortion groups stepped up their campaigns. Victoria General, a regional teaching hospital, performs the most abortions annually in Atlantic Canada, about 1,500. Robert O'Neil, president of the Nova Scotia Parkinson's Foundation, said the news of the transplant "will be a Christmas present for a lot of those who suffer Parkinson's." Still, members of the foundation and the doctors involved acknowledged that the procedure would help only a few sufferers. Halifax neurologist Dr. David King said only 3 to 4 per cent of Parkinson's patients would be eligible for such transplants. He said the operation is performed only on severely affected patients whose medication no longer helps. Many in that situation already are showing signs of mental deterioration and would not be helped by a fetal transplant, he said. Suitable candidates are mentally able "yet entombed in their bodies." Dr. Fine said the team has already chosen the five other transplant recipients. Depending on availability of operating rooms and the team's ability to choose the right brain cells from fetuses aborted near the time of the scheduled operation, the next transplants could take place within two months, he said. Dr. Badley said the research team used strict criteria to choose recipients. (The hospital restricted the study to Nova Scotia's 2,000 Parkinson's patients because they are available for long-term study.) Candidates had to have reached the stage where medication no longer helps, been capable of giving informed consent, and not had any other physical diseases. The women whose aborted fetuses were used in the experiment were not asked for their specific consent. Instead, they were asked to sign general consent forms, releasing fetal and placental material for use in research and for therapeutic purposes. Copyright Deborah Jones 1991 First Canadian transplant planned Nova Scotia hospital to become first in Canada to transplant fetal tissue to treat Parkinson's disease. Published: The Globe and Mail, February 21, 1990, pg. A.1 BY DEBORAH JONES, HALIFAX Researchers and doctors in Halifax are planning to transplant tissue from aborted fetuses into adults suffering from Parkinson's disease. The Victoria General Hospital, the first in Canada to undertake the controversial procedure, announced yesterday it has approved a trial program which is to begin later this year. Researchers at Dalhousie University's medical faculty and staff at the Victoria General will transplant brain cells from aborted fetuses into the brains of four or five patients, hospital president Bernard Badley said yesterday. The procedure, which is also being investigated in several other countries, is thought to greatly reduce the debilitating symptoms of Parkinson's victims in the severe stages of the disease. About 50,000 people in Canada suffer from Parkinson's. Earlier this month, researchers in Sweden reported the first clear evidence that transplants of fetal brain tissue can significantly improve the condition of people with Parkinson's. Anti-abortion groups vehemently oppose transplants of aborted fetal tissue. Dr. Badley said committees of medical and lay people considered the ethics of the fetal transplant procedure for two years before deciding in favor of it at the Victoria General, a regional teaching hospital. "We developed the feeling that it was relatively easy to separate the two components, abortion and the use of tissue obtained by that process as a completely separate issue, with the potential benefit for patients suffering with Parkinson's disease," he said in an interview. Parkinson's is caused by the lack of a chemical messenger in the brain, dopamine, which for some reason the patient no longer produces. Dopamine is essential for the brain to transmit signals to the body, and successfully transplanted fetal cells have been shown to produce dopamine within the patient's brain. Dr. Badley said using fetal cells, rather than mature organ donors, is necessary for the process. "Fetal tissue by its immaturity is not recognized as being a foreign substance, so there's no rejection, no requirement for anti-rejection drugs." Ann Marie Tomlins of the Council for Life said yesterday anti-abortion groups would oppose the Victoria General's plan. "Our major concern is the transplants depend on the use of deliberate killing of unborn human beings," Mrs. Tomlins said. The group is also concerned that the research will be expanded to include fetal transplants for people with Alzheimer's and other diseases. "You're going to look at a great demand for unborn children that are aborted," she said. Dr. Badley, noting that abortions are already carried out (more than 1,500 are performed at the Victoria General each year), rejected the assertion by anti-abortion groups that the process will result in "fetal harvesting." "There's an analogy in that I don't condone murder, but if someone is shot through the head and their organs are available ..... I see no reason not to use them." Copyright Deborah Jones 1990 About this website: Text and photos by Deborah Jones except where otherwise noted. Please contact me for reprint rights. All material copyrighted ../About.htmlshapeimage_1_link_0
Nova Scotia woman first Canadian recipient
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