That stem cell study is beginning to come apart. This morning’s Washington Post points to some of the deceptions in the publicity surrounding it, and also notes that Nature magazine has now edited the original release they did on the article and added material to the article itself (although Nature doesn’t seem to have actually done that yet, from what I can see)
None of it answers the major problems with the key claims made by the company that did the experiment, though, and repeated all over the press–that they created stem cells without destroying embryos, or that they showed it could be done. Both those claims are false. The Post article says the Nature study’s “basic facts are unchallenged” but no one is challenging the study’s facts, what people are challenging is the coverage of the study (including the Post’s own coverage) which now turns out to have been wrong, as a direct result of deceptive statements by the scientists involved here.
Wesley Smith has a good piece on this in the Weekly Standard now too, and reminds us of past deceptions this same company has tried to pull off
It’s looking like another stem cell fraud. But none of it should reflect poorly on the efforts to get embryonic-type stem cells without harming embryos. Those continue, and prospects look good, and every effort to attempt it–even this failed one–should be looked at as a good sign that scientists are coming to agree that common ground is possible on stem cells, and are working to find it. They should be encouraged and supported.