Federal Funding of Stem Cell Research Halted

A federal judge ruled that Obama’s 2009 executive orders on the funding of stem cell research violated existing law on Monday.

Chief Judge Royce C. Lamberth of Federal District Court for the District of Columbia issued the injunction in an effort to return federal policy to the “status quo,” according to his ruling. But many of those affected by the ruling seemed confused as to what exactly that meant.

Steven H. Aden, senior counsel for one of the groups that sued to stop the Obama administrations orders, said that the ruling meant “for now the N.I.H. cannot issue funding grants to embryonic stem cell research projects without any further order from the court.”

On the other hand, Dr. George Q. Daley, director of the stem cell transplantation program at Children’s Hospital Boston, said that he told his teams not to feed any of their cells tomorrow with materials funded by the US government. He also added that the ruling would mean a huge disruption for dozens of labs across the country.

Other officials said that the Justice Department would be reading the ruling and interpreting it for them.

Lamberth wrote, “If one step or ‘piece of research’ of an E.S.C. research project results in the destruction of an embryo, the entire project is precluded from receiving federal funding.” His ruling was based on the Dickey-Wicker Amendment. This law is renewed annually, and state that no federal financing will be used in research in which human embryos are discarded, destroyed, or knowing subject to such dangers.

The suit was brought by two doctors that worked exclusively with adult stem cells. The case was originally dismissed because none of the myriad of plaintiffs had standing, but an appeals court ruled that the doctors did face material loss if the new rules were enacted and therefore could pursue the case.