NEW JERSEY’S Governor signed into law a Bill that the American bishops said was “designed to encourage government-sanctioned ‘human foetus farms”.
Speaking for the US Conference of Catholic Bishops, Cathy Cleaver Ruse said that the New Jersey law, introduced by Governor James McGreevey, was “the most extreme, inhumane procloning legislation in the country”.
The Bill allows scientific research using stem cells from human embryos to continue in the state and authorises a system by which people may donate unused human embryos for research.
It does not provide state funds for stem-cell research or legalise practices that previously were prohibited. It criminalises what it defines as human cloning while permitting other types of embryonic stem-cell research.