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Stem Cell Federalism Flunks in New Jersey
Some bioethics and health policy wonks have recently argued that the unprecedented state-based stem cell research initiatives stimulated by the Bush administration’s limits on federal funding show the virtues of federalism. The theory seems to work for states like California, Massachusetts, New York and Wisconsin, but New Jersey voters have rejected a $450 million bond issue for stem cell research, in spite of Gov. Jon Corzine’s strong support.
The New Jersey vote demonstrates that state-based investment in long-term science can easily get caught up in local politics. Garden State voters apparently decided the issue not on ideology but on the finances. They’re concerned that the state’s fiscal house is in disorder and don’t want Trenton to borrow more money, at least until matters get sorted out.
There’s another local element that makes New Jersey special in this field. It is home to large pharmaceutical companies that will someday get into stem cell-based medicine by buying up small companies that have spun off from basic research that will happen in other states.
So enthusiasm about state stem cell initiatives needs to be tempered by the New Jersey experience, as well as by the inefficiencies that can arise from doing basic biomedical research without coordination by the National Institutes of Health. As I and my colleagues have written before, the states can’t go it alone.
Comments on this article
Jonathan,
I concur. It wasn’t ideology that killed the NJ bond measure, it was concerns about finances and lack of credibilty on how this would benefit the economy at least in the short run.
It’s something to keep in mind for human embryonic stem cell research advocates who thus far are eager to point the finger at the pro-lifers, to keep the issue contentious even in a blue state.
Playing the ideology card as the reason for the bond measure’s failure, as embryonic stem cell research advocates like to do, isn’t necessary in a blue state, and even misses the point.
Though the NJ bond measure never really was about embryonic stem cell research anyway, as I point out in my earlier article on Science Progress, many in the public still erroneously perceive it as such.
Until New Jersey gets a surplus in its budget, like it had in 2002, I think a stem cell bond measure will be a hard sell in New Jersey.
November 9th, 2007 at 10:47 am