Reagan Weighs Human Fetus Research Ban

President Reagan is considering issuing an executive order that would ban federally funded research with human fetal tissue, Administration officials said Thursday.

A draft of a proposed executive order--which would prohibit “harmful biomedical and behavioral research activities and transplantations procedures” on human fetuses, unless such research is intended to benefit the fetus--was sent to Health and Human Services Secretary Otis R. Bowen earlier this week for his comments, the officials said.

“We want to put the executive order in clearance” through the reviewing agencies “as soon as possible,” said a letter to Bowen that accompanied the draft order, copies of which were obtained by The Times. The letter, signed by White House domestic policy adviser Gary L. Bauer, asked that Bowen return his comments to the White House no later than today. A spokesman for HHS said only that Bowen had received the draft and that it was “under review.”

The issue of fetal tissue research has been an extremely volatile one, pitting right-to-life advocates against medical researchers who have come to believe in recent years that the use of the tissue shows extraordinary promise in the treatment of such illnesses as juvenile diabetes, Parkinson’s disease and leukemia. Most such research involves the use of living fetal tissue obtained as the result of abortion.

The White House consideration comes one week before the National Institutes of Health plans a series of public hearings on the subject to determine whether a moratorium on such federal research, imposed last April, should be lifted.

Hearings Planned

At that time, the Reagan Administration instituted a temporary ban on all experiments at the NIH that use tissue from aborted fetuses, just as the agency was poised to begin experimental surgery implanting fetal tissue into patients with Parkinson’s disease. Dr. Robert E. Windom, assistant secretary for health, then directed NIH Director James B. Wyngaarden to establish an outside advisory committee to study the medical, ethical and legal concerns of such research. The committee hearings are planned for next Wednesday, Thursday and Friday at the NIH.

“There is no intention on the part of the White House to take any action before these hearings take place,” said one Administration official, who requested anonymity. “Nothing will be done without full consultation with the Department of Health and Human Services,” the parent agency of the NIH.

He said, however, that the President “is interested in the issue and quite a bit of his constituency is interested in the issue. There are all sorts of concerns about where this road is headed.”

Researchers Distressed

Researchers said that they were distressed at the prospect of an executive order forbidding the use of fetal tissue for federally funded biomedical research. A large part of medical research is funded by grants from the federal government.

“If we abandon fetal research, we might indirectly be prevented from saving the lives of children--that is the bottom line,” said Dr. Hans Sollinger, professor of surgery at the University of Wisconsin, who is scheduled to testify next week. “The people who make these rules and regulations should think very carefully about their potential impact.”

He added: “With fetal transplantation--especially in the case of juvenile diabetes--we’re trying to save the lives of children, and there are thousands and thousands of such children in this country. This is very valuable biological material, which otherwise would be absolutely wasted.”

Dr. Howard S. Tager, professor of biochemistry and molecular biology at the University of Chicago, agreed.

Seen as ‘Highly Ethical’

“I believe the use of fetal human tissues in biomedical research--for the betterment of mankind--is a very highly ethical use of what is available, since abortion is legal,” he said.

Fetal tissue has assumed increasing importance in research in recent years, particularly in transplant procedures, because it grows more quickly than adult tissue, can adapt more readily in the human body and is less likely to be rejected by a patient’s immune system. In the transplant procedures, healthy fetal cells are transplanted into patients to take over functions no longer performed by defective or diseased cells. Currently, most aborted fetuses are cremated.

Some of the more explosive ethical questions, however, are expected to be debated next week. They include whether fetal research would encourage women to have abortions, and, further, whether women may decide to intentionally become pregnant--and undergo an abortion--to make fetal tissue available to a loved one with a disease that could be treated with the tissue.

Comparison to Nuremberg

Robert G. Marshall, director of research for the American Life League, said that his organization plans to speak out against the research at next week’s hearings.