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Because BIO represents smaller companies, Greenwood said, it can be more effective on a variety of issues. "Unless they have a consensus, they do nothing," Greenwood said of PhRMA.

The stem cell issue created a national stir at the beginning of President Bush's first term when he prohibited future federal funding of embryonic stem-cell research beyond those cell lines that had already been established at that time.

Of course, like most press comment, this does not quite state the position accurately. Readers of Life Matters know well that President Bush liberalized the policy to permit funding for research on stem cells from embryos for the first time—the Clinton administration did not fund it at all, since the prohibition was in law.

According to the Tribune-Review, the University of Pittsburgh has done some serious thinking as they clean up the fallout of the Korean cloning fiasco, in which their own esteemed professor Gerald Schatten was closely involved.

The University of Pittsburgh's lax policies and disregard for federal guidelines allowed biologist Gerald Schatten to participate in one of the biggest scientific frauds in history, according to a Pittsburgh Tribune-Review examination.

At issue is a Pitt-sanctioned collaboration between Schatten and Korean scientists headed by Hwang Woo-Suk in the controversial field of human embryonic stem-cell research.

The Tribune-Review uncovered basic flaws in the university's approach to supervising Schatten's research, and the article quotes many of the mainstream bioethics gurus in their critical observations on what happened. Of course, there is huge embarrassment in the pro-cloning world that not only did Hwang falsify his results, but a famed American scientist also signed onto his conclusions, however innocent of fraud Schatten may have been. There's no doubt that the madcap enthusiasm for "stem-cell research" (that is, the embryonic variety and especially the kind that involves cloning) played a huge part in fanning the flames of this fraud, in the U.S. as in Korea.

Meanwhile, women whose eggs were used in the Hwang experiments are suing, according to the English-language Korea Times, which has covered this story very thoroughly:

Two women who donated their eggs to now-disgraced cloning expert Hwang Woo-suk have filed a lawsuit against the state and two medical centers, claiming they had not been informed about potential risks posed by egg retrieval processes.

In the suit filed with the Seoul Central District Court Friday, the donors, including a 20-year-old identified as A, are each seeking 32 million won ($33,600) medical compensation against the state, local fertility clinic Mizmedi Hospital and the Hanyang University Medical Center.

The two hospitals collaborated with Hwang, a gene-scientist formerly employed by Seoul National University (SNU), in his studies on cloned human stem cells, recently exposed as fraudulent.

Civic groups, such as the Korea Women's Association United (KWAU) and the Lawyers for a Democratic Society (Minbyun), plan on providing consulting and financial support to the two throughout the trials.

As for Hwang, he is appealing against his firing by prestigious Seoul National University—even as the police investigate his activities and consider charging him with fraud or embezzlement.

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April (Web-only) 2006, Vol. 50