Social ethics of embryo and stem cell research

United States debates over stem cell research too often take the status of the embryo as the only decisive ethical issue, assume that if the embryo cannot be shown to be a person its destruction for a good cause is justified, and are insufficiently critical of economic incentives to legitimate and fund such research. Even if stem cell research ought not be banned, it could be situated and controlled on a spectrum of other health care needs through limited funding policies; aggressive peer review; regulatory and legal oversight applying to all research, however funded; and stringent patenting criteria.