‘Family-Planning’ Funds Cut

ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH, May 9 — Missouri's pro-life legislators have cut $3.6 million from the state budget that would have gone to Planned Parenthood and other so-called “family-planning” organizations.

Victorious pro-lifers pointed out that, while none of the $3.6 million allocation has directly paid for abortions, the “family-planning” funds are intermingled and have helped subsidize abortion businesses in the past.

The budget cut was one of many reductions made in the state budget due to a financial shortfall, reported the St. Louis daily newspaper. Unfortunately, a $700,000 allotment to an “abortion-alternatives” program was also eliminated.

British Docs Say No to Death

BBC NEWS, May 13 — If physician-assisted suicide is ever legalized in the United Kingdom, the vast majority of U.K. physicians will refuse to help patients kill themselves.

That's according to an Internet poll of 986 doctors, reported by the British Broadcasting Corp., in which 74% stated their opposition to the practice.

More than half said they have been asked for help to die by a patient, yet 56% also said they considered it impossible to set safe bounds to guard against the misuse of euthanasia. The survey was conducted by Doctors.net.co.uk and commissioned by the pro-life campaign group Right to Life.

Adult Stem Cells for Liver Damage

WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF MEDICINE, May 14 — Stem cells from bone marrow or umbilical-cord blood may be useful for treating people with liver damage due to cirrhosis, viral infection, trauma, chemotherapy or radiation therapy. That's according to research performed at, and reported by, the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis.

“There is a huge demand for liver transplants but there are never enough organs, and the procedure is not always successful,” said study leader Jan Nolta, Ph.D., an associate professor of medicine at the school. “We're hoping that, in the future, we can use stem cells from … matched donors to help treat liver disease and reduce the need for liver transplants.”

The study, done in immune-deficient mice, showed that human stem cells that normally produce blood cells also can form liver-like cells in a damaged liver. The researchers published their findings in the May 15 issue of the medical journal Blood.

Abstinence vs. Contraception?

AMERICAN LIFE LEAGUE, May 5 — Research published in the April 2003 Journal of Adolescent and Family Health shows that abstinence, not contraception, is the main reason why teen birth and pregnancy rates are declining.

The report explains that researchers have studied teen birth and pregnancy rates from 1991 and 1994 — and concluded that, among unmarried girls, abstinence accounted for the entire decline in births and 67% of the drop in pregnancies.

According to data collected by the Planned Parenthood-affiliated Alan Guttmacher Institute, there were 85.6 pregnancies for every 1,000 girls ages 15 to 19 in 1999, 27% lower than the record high of 116.9 pregnancies per 1,000 teens in 1990.