Dear Editor:
Recently the state was stunned when the embryonic stem cell bill was unceremoniously pulled from a vote in the Assembly. The Assembly was the last step in approving his bill. Bob Novak and the Religious Right had their day, and the people of New Jersey were the losers.
As a resident of New Jersey who has spent the last two years blind due to complications from Type 2 diabetes, I have been calling my friends and legislators to support Assembly Bill A2840, which would legalize stem cell research in New Jersey and open new doors of hope for tens of thousands of New Jerseyans suffering from ailments like diabetes, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, spinal injuries, sickle cell anemia, Tay-Sachs disease and scores more. Researchers in Wisconsin recently announced that they have taken encouraging steps into coaxing stem cells to produce new cells for therapeutic purposes.
After this bill passed the Senate in December, U.S. Senator Jon Corzine, Speaker Albio Sires and Governor McGreevey all called for swift passage of the bill. I was told by friends in Trenton that the bill would pass the Assembly without incident. That’s why I’m so puzzled that members of both parties in the Assembly caved in to a right-wing, inside the beltway columnist who sets foot in the Garden State as often as Hans Blix. The column compared me and other supporters of this bill to the Raelians and other loonies who believe that this bill will turn cloned New Jersey embryos into crops like tomatoes and blueberries. Nothing could be further from the truth! We are talking about unused embryos frozen in fertility clinics across the state that would be washed down the drain if not used. Novak’s column, a few days of phone calls by New Jersey’s small but dedicated followers of the Rligious Right resulted in a gutless move by the Assembly to delay the vote.
This bill gives New Jersey’s pharmaceutical and biotech industries the green light to developing cures for the diseases I mentioned above. Economically it will do for New Jersey what the silicon chip did for California. But more importantly, it gives tens of thousands of us a small but significant ray of hope to free us from the prisons of our illnesses.
If you are watching a parent or relative slowly slip away due to Alzheimer’s, call your Assembly representative now.
If a close friend endures the horrific pain of sickle cell anemia, write your Assembly representative now.
The best gift you can give is the gift of hope for a friend or loved one who has little hope for a cure.
There are 80 people in both parties stadning in the way of hope. You can find your Assembly member’s name, address and phone nunber on the Internet at: http//www.njleg.state.nj.us/members/legsearch.asp and contact us at right2hope@yahoo.co. The Religious Right learned years ago that a small group of dedicated individuals can make New Jersey’s supposedly “moderate”representatives cower. Now the silent majority of New Jerseyans cannot be silent any longer. A vote delayed is vote denied, and we will be making our voices heard in the coming weeks.
Paul J. Byrne