Another adult stem-cell success story.

Yet again, claims made by proponents of embryonic stem-cell research have been shown to be inaccurate, according to a December 17 AP news story. (See "Pro-life Stem-cell Therapy" in our December 27, 2004 issue.) During the recent presidential campaign, liberals erroneously claimed that research using destroyed human embryos was needed to cure a variety of diseases because research had shown that adult stem cells (obtained from umbilical cord blood and human tat, among other sources) did not readily change into other types of cells--such as bone cells and nerve cells.

In an operation to repair 19 square inches of a seven-year-old girl's skull that had been damaged in a fall two years before, doctors shaved bits of bone one-tenth of an inch long from the girl's pelvis and placed these in the missing areas of the skull. They then added stem cells to the bone chips, cells that had been derived from fat taken from the girl's buttocks.

"The skull is now smooth to the touch, the missing parts replaced by thin but solid bone," AP quoted Dr. Hans-Peter Howaldt of the Justus-Liebig-University Medical School in Giessen, Germany, as saying. The combination of stem cells and bone chips caused new bone to grow.

Before undergoing the successful surgery, the girl needed to wear a helmet to protect her brain, which could "sometimes be seen pulsating through the missing areas of her skull," said AP.