Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill [Lords]

Sir Alan—[Interruption.] I know he is a great cricketer in the making. It is, I think, the desire of all stem cell scientists one day to take an adult stem cell and reprogramme it to be just like an embryonic stem cell—one that can, with growth factors, be turned into different types of tissues. That is the ““El Dorado”” and claims have been made that we are moving in that direction, particularly, as has been pointed out, on the basis of work done by Yamanaka at Kyoto university. It is important to be critical of his work and to be aware of how far it goes, as it has been used as an example to show that adult cells have something major to offer in this field. We use viral vectors in this area; they are called retroviruses and they have a habit of carrying genes into the chromosomes of the cells where the retrovirus is incorporated. I believe there are 20 sites in the particular cells that Yamanaka has looked at. There are 20 copies of this virus lying there, influencing how the particular genes work. It is argued by some people that the cells turn into embryonic-type cells. However, anyone who looks at Yamanaka's paper and dissects it in detail, as I have, will see that it is nothing like that. There are many problems and flaws—and not just with the retrovirus, as it may be possible to get round that and find other ways to get the particular genes in to turn the cells back into the embryonic stage. Only very few of the colony cells that are treated develop any kind of resemblance to an embryonic cell. It is something in the region of 10 out of 50,000 cells that take on some of the properties associated with embryonic cells. Yamanaka is quite critical about it in his own paper. He says that there are"““minor genetic alterations, which could not be detected by karyo-type analyses, or epigenetic alterations””," which may be necessary for ““cell induction””. He continues:"““These issues need to be elucidated in future studies.””" He goes on to say in respect of the particular human cells influenced by the virus that it is unlikely at this stage for anyone to be able to commit to saying that these cells are very like embryonic cells. Even that work, then, leaves a lot to be desired. We have heard about adult cord cells. It is absolutely true that they are very effective in certain haemopoietic diseases—blood diseases, anaemias and so on—but they are unable to turn into other cell types. Clearly, there is a lot yet to learn about adult cells and cord cells. We still have the mystery of life around us. It is still possible to take a plant cell and grow the whole plant. I have always wondered about the secrets of plants without for a minute thinking of turning a plant into a human being. Gosh, we might get funding from some source to look into that. There is some magical mystery there that we have to discover, in which we can turn cells around into different tissues. Plants have something to offer in that area. With the particular cells that would be made, we could treat single patients—that is true—but a culture of embryonic stem cells can be grown to treat lots of different patients with a particular condition. That is the El Dorado; that is the dream. Degenerative diseases can be handled in a larger arena than the single individual. Stem cells, too, are something quite new, and it is argued that we have not turned up anything yet. Stem cells were debated in this place in 2001, and were legitimised in terms of our being able to do any work with them. Their isolation was achieved in Wisconsin in the USA in 1998. The first licences in this country for doing any work with them came in 2003, so we are five years along the line and people are expecting major results that will turn the world around. How long does it take any good company in this country or in the USA to develop a drug? It takes 20 to 40 years. Do we ever hear people being critical of drug companies being slow? They have many, many tests to go through, which we should be glad about.