STEM CELL research using human embryos should be permitted in the State in certain situations, a major report to be published today will recommend.
The report of the Irish Council for Bioethics, an independent State-funded body, which conducted an extensive public consultation process on the topic, says legislation should be provided for embryonic stem cell research, but only under the strict condition of "informed consent" from embryo donors.
In a finding that is likely to draw strong criticism from the Catholic Church, the council argues that while human embryos have a "significant moral value", based on their potential to develop into persons and because they represent human life in its earliest stages, they do not have "full moral status".
Although the value of human life demands that we hold "significant respect" for embryos, it also demands that we consider our obligations to care for humankind more generally, the report states.
As a result, the council supports the carefully-regulated use of "supernumerary" embryos - namely those embryos produced during in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) treatments that are surplus to IVF requirements - for stem cell research "aimed at alleviating human suffering".
It says these embryos will otherwise be destroyed.
Although valuable research is being done with stem cells originating from adult - or fully developed - material, the current scientific consensus is that embryonic stem cells remain the "gold standard" and have more potential uses than their adult counterparts, it says.
"The decision to donate supernumerary embryos for research should be voluntary, free from any form of coercion, and made under the strict conditions of informed consent," the report states. This consent would be required from the parents of the embryo.
However, the report stops short of supporting the creation of embryos specifically for the purposes of research, which it says is not "currently justified" while supernumerary IVF embryos already exist.
"This is based on the recognition of the need to avoid the instrumentalisation of embryos and women and on the value of the embryo as a symbol of how we treat each other as members of the human race," it states.
The report, which will be circulated to several Government departments as well as all members of the Oireachtas, is likely to prompt significant concern among church leaders and others.
The Irish Bishops' Conference has, in the past, said that "using a human embryo as an object of research is nothing short of destruction of human life". Instead, it advocates the use of adult stem cells, which can be taken from umbilical cord blood, bone marrow and some other tissues and organs.
The report's proposals also go against the main findings of a questionnaire completed by nearly 2,200 individuals with an interest in the subject, circulated as part of the consultation process, in which the majority opposed any form of embryonic stem cell research.