The Latest from the NIH re the hESC Ruling

UC Davis stem cell research Paul Knoepfler this afternoon reported on the latest from the NIH on the federal court ruling on hESC research.

Writing on his blog, he quoted the text of the statement and then offered a comment.

“Pursuant to a court order issued August 23, 2010, NIH is not accepting submissions of information about human embryonic stem cell lines for NIH review. All review of human embryonic stem cell lines under the NIH Guidelines is suspended. The February 23, 2010, proposal to revise the Guidelines is also suspended.

“My interpretation of this is that basically all the changes to embryonic stem cell policy under the Obama administration and all the federally funded use of ES cell lines approved under the new guidelines during this administration is suspended. No one should bother submitting new lines for approval and those that were under review are not going to be reviewed any more. All of that is frozen.”