Prolife legislators working on passing stem cell reporting legislation

Prolife legislators in Michigan are hoping to pass legislation which would require universities who take part in embryonic stem cell to report a variety of items, including the number of human embryos they have, how many human embryos they've killed, etc.

Some Republican lawmakers want to know exactly how Michigan's research universities are using stem cells. They want the universities to report how many human embryos they have and how many stem-cell lines they have created using them.

The measure was tucked into the higher education funding bill passed last week along a party-line vote in a higher education subcommittee. The same method was tried last year to get the measure passed, but it failed.

"We want to know exactly what's going on with stem cells," said state Rep. Bob Genetski, R-Saugatuck, chairman of the subcommittee. "It's still a pretty big issue. We can at least keep a grip on what's going on."

He said those who led the drive in 2008 to get voters to approve the use of stem cells from human embryos promised the move would create jobs.

He's skeptical that's happening.

"Some of us feel duped," he said.

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