(MADISON) California has one of the largest amounts of public funding for stem cell research. A conservative think tank questions such funding in a report that highlights Wisconsin’s more modest financial support for such research.
Later this month, Madison will host the World Stem Cell Summit. States and nations with plenty of taxpayer funding for that purpose will be showcased along with states that don’t bankroll that type of science, instead leaving it to private companies to come up with the cash.
The role of Wisconsin taxpayers in funding stem cell research is small. This fact is lauded by the Competitive Enterprise Institute, which noted UW Madison researcher James Thomson’s 1998 discovery of human embryonic stem cells was privately funded. The Institute notes embryonic stem cell research is speculative and politically controversial; therefore it says government should leave it to the private sector. (Third item.)