Hugh Hewitt comments on a WaPo article reporting that tissue from aborted fetuses can be used to treat burns, asking:
What if "tests show" that the only fetal tissue that works is ninth month fetal tissue? {Ed. Good question!}
"One fetus could theoretically provide material for hundreds or thousands of burn victims, although Hohlfeld said he suspected that would not remove some people's objections to the use of tissue from an aborted fetus."
That is the only discussion of the moral aspect of this "testing." Can the Washington Post editors at least ask around a bit about implications?
I was wondering about those implications from my usual perspective of a Catholic layman with an amateur's interest in moral theology, so I did a little research. I didn't find anything directly on point, but I did find a statement by the Pontifical Academy for Life on the use of vaccines prepared from cells derived from aborted fetuses, which strikes me as a close enough analogy.
The Statement is lengthy, but this strikes me as the critical section:
... one must consider morally illicit every form of formal cooperation -- sharing the evil intention -- in the action of those who have performed a voluntary abortion, which in turn has allowed the retrieval of fetal tissues, required for the preparation of vaccines. Therefore, whoever -- regardless of the category to which he belongs -- cooperates in some way, sharing its intention, to the performance of a voluntary abortion with the aim of producing the above-mentioned vaccines, participates, in actuality, in the same moral evil as the person who has performed that abortion.
As regards the preparation, distribution and marketing of vaccines produced as a result of the use of biological material whose origin is connected with cells coming from fetuses voluntarily aborted, such a process is stated, as a matter of principle, morally illicit, because it could contribute in encouraging the performance of other voluntary abortions, with the purpose of the production of such vaccines. [Ed.: This strikes me as the most problematic portion of the analysis. Given the vast number of abortions that already occur, it would have seemed to me that a pro-life doctor's use of such cells for therapeutic purposes would be most unlikely to provide any incentives for additional abortions. I suppose the argument would be that such use removes feelings of guilt and so on, which might marginally increase the odds of a woman choosing to abort, but this seems pretty attenuated to me.]
As regards those who need to use such vaccines for reasons of health, it must be emphasized that, apart from every form of formal cooperation, in general, doctors or parents who resort to the use of these vaccines for their children, in spite of knowing their origin -- voluntary abortion -- carry out a form of very remote mediate material cooperation, and thus very mild, in the performance of the original act of abortion, and a mediate material cooperation, with regard to the marketing of cells coming from abortions, and immediate, with regard to the marketing of vaccines produced with such cells.
...It is up to the faithful and citizens of upright conscience -- parents, doctors, etc. -- to oppose, even by making an objection of conscience, the ever more widespread attacks against life and the "culture of death" which underlies them.
From this point of view, the use of vaccines whose production is connected with procured abortion constitutes at least a mediate remote passive material cooperation to the abortion, and an immediate passive material cooperation with regard to their marketing. Furthermore, on a cultural level, the use of such vaccines contributes in the creation of a generalized social consensus to the operation of the pharmaceutical industries which produce them in an immoral way.
Therefore, doctors and parents have a duty to take recourse to alternative vaccines [13] -- if they exist -- putting pressure on the political authorities and health systems so that other vaccines without moral problems become available. They should take recourse, if necessary, to the use of conscientious objection [14] with regard to the use of vaccines produced by means of cell lines of aborted human fetal origin.
Equally, they should oppose by all means -- in writing, through the various associations, mass media, etc. -- the vaccines which do not yet have morally acceptable alternatives, creating pressure so that alternative vaccines are prepared, which are not connected with the abortion of a human fetus, and requesting rigorous legal control of the pharmaceutical industry producers.
As regards the diseases against which there are no alternative vaccines which are available and ethically acceptable, it is right to abstain from using these vaccines if it can be done without causing children, and indirectly the population as a whole, to undergo significant risks to their health.
However, if the latter are exposed to considerable dangers to their health, vaccines with moral problems pertaining to them may also be used on a temporary basis.
The moral reason is that the duty to avoid passive material cooperation is not obligatory if there is grave inconvenience. Moreover, we find, in such a case, a proportional reason, in order to accept the use of these vaccines in the presence of the danger of favoring the spread of the pathological agent, due to the lack of vaccination of children. This is particularly true in the case of vaccination against German measles [15].
If I'm reading this right, the orthodox Catholic opinion would be that fetal tissue should be used to repair burn damage only where the patient faces "considerable dangers to their health" and there is no viable medical alternative. Given what I know about burn treatment, that seems unlikely to be the case very often. Hence, I don't think that exception would come into play.
