David Prentice, Ph.D.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently approved not just one, but two new gene therapies for sickle cell disease. The success of adult stem cell therapies continues to demonstrate that the progress of science and medicine need not rely on ethically compromised research and treatment approaches.

On Friday, September 22, 2023, Dr. David Prentice and Dr. Tara Sander Lee presented at Faith and Law's Friday Forum session on Capitol Hill.

The trafficking of aborted baby body parts for research is barbaric. The Trump administration was dedicated to ending this practice and protecting the sanctity of human life. Grave injustices were exposed that exploited unborn children for experimentation, but were not fully remedied.

On March 17, 2021, the Arizona House Judiciary Committee held a hearing on SB 1457, a bill to prohibit prenatal discrimination. Charlotte Lozier Institute’s Vice President and Research Director David A. Prentice, Ph.D., was invited by Senator Nancy Barto to testify as an expert witness, and submitted the following testimony.

CLI’s analysis found that a majority of vaccine candidates did not use abortion-derived cell lines in their production. Several used abortion-derived cell lines in laboratory testing, or their use in testing could not be determined. Experts urge all vaccine developers to use noncontroversial alternatives.

“Uninformed commentary has emerged this morning stating that President Trump has received a medication created with the use of human embryonic stem cells.  CLI has reviewed the published information and our conclusion is straightforward: The president was not given any medicines to treat COVID-19 that involved the destruction of human life.  No human embryonic stem cells or human fetal tissue were used to produce the treatments President Trump received--period.

Accurate information about the development and production of COVID-19 vaccines is essential, especially because many proposed candidates use newer molecular technologies for production of a viral vaccine.  One concern regarding the ethical assessment of viral vaccine candidates is the potential use of abortion-derived cell lines in the development, production or testing of a vaccine.  This analysis utilizes data from the primary scientific literature when available, along with data from clinical trial documents, reputable vaccine tracking websites, and published commercial information.1  It is the hope that by providing accurate data, recipients can make well-informed decisions regarding vaccine choices.

At the Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity annual summer conference "Bioethics in Real Life,” Dr. David Prentice and Dr. Tara Sander Lee presented a workshop entitled Designing Babies: Science, Ethics, and Policies of a Post-Genomic Era. Scientific advancements in the fields of genetics, molecular diagnosis, and genetic engineering were introduced so that participants could better understand the benefits, risks, limitations, policies, and potential impact on society. The ethics were carefully evaluated and discussed.

As a result of the rapid spread of the new coronavirus technically known as SARS-CoV-2, the United States and other governments have begun crash efforts to create an effective vaccine or vaccines against the illness at “warp speed.”  An array of candidates for this vaccine have emerged and are in various stages of development and testing.  At the same time, questions have emerged about the ways in which these vaccines, reflecting experience across the history of development of these preventives, are produced, including processes to which millions of Americans object on moral grounds.  The variety of means used to produce vaccines today is immense, employing both ethically licit and questionable procedures.  To assist in understanding these modes of production, we offer this primer on the basic science involved.

Como resultado de la rápida propagación del nuevo coronavirus, técnicamente conocido como SARS-CoV-2, los gobiernos de Estados Unidos y de otros paises han pasado por varios intentos fallidos en la producción de una vacuna efectiva contra esta enfermedad que se transmite tan rápidamente.  Ha surgido una selección de candidatos para esta vacuna  y se encuentran en distintas etapas de desarrollo y de prueba.  Al mismo tiempo, se han manifestado otras preguntas acerca de la manera en la cual estas vacunas son producidas; inlcuyendo los procesos sobre los cuales millones de americanos tienen objeciones en material moral.  Hoy en día, la variedad de medios utilizados para producir vacunas es inmensa; en algunos casos son éticament lícitas, mientras que en otros los procedimientos que utilizan son questionables.  Para ayudar a la comprensión de estos modos de producción, ofrecemos una guía básica respecto a la ciencia involucrada.