Hopes for stem cell research ‘unrealistic’
Public expectation about the benefits of stem cell research has been raised too high and is unlikely to be fulfilled in the near future, a leading fertility expert has warned.
Lord Winston said the widely-held belief that this kind of research would lead to cures for degenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s within years was unlikely.
And he warned scientists were taking “grave risks” in raising expectations too high, saying it could exacerbate the already declining trust in science among members of the public.
“While I think that one of the most exciting and most valuable areas of biology at the moment – stem cell research – is important, it will be, I think, quite a long time before the fruits of this work will really be of value,” Lord Winston told Today.
“And I want to point out that sometimes there’s a risk that we may have raised expectations too much, too quickly. For example, I think there’s a good chance for Parkinson’s, a very poor chance for Alzheimer’s.”
The professor, who founded the first IVF programme on the NHS, was speaking ahead of a speech to the British Association for the Advancement of Science conference in Dublin later today.
He admitted there was a tendency for enthusiastic scientists to “oversell” research, but said governments were as much to blame as the science community. Either way, such a tendency could be damaging for the public’s faith in science, which was already not very high.
“Of course if you make claims which can’t then be justified, or if people perceive that claims have been made which can’t be justified, then of course that mistrust grows and I think that that would be very bad for science, very bad for education and very bad really indeed for the way Britain is going and leading in some of these areas,” Lord Winston said.
He added: “One of the issues here is that science is not about certainty, it’s very often very uncertain indeed and what we can’t do is to make absolute promises about how things are going to turn out.
“That I see as a very big issue for society, because of course how you use your science often may not be entirely predictable and that is something which the public is also quite worried about.”
