The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has reportedly reversed a policy- enacted under former President Trump - meant to halt all research using aborted fetal tissue.
In 2019, the said policy halted new research using fetal tissue of aborted babies at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) facilities. This was applied to both new and ongoing research which require new fetal tissue from elective abortions, reports Liberty Counsel.
In August 2020, the Human Fetal Tissue Research Ethics Advisory board recommended in their report to withhold funding for research proposals that would use the body parts of aborted babies. The report was presented to the Secretary of HHS and to Congress.
Now that HHS is under Xavier Becerra and with the Trump-era policy reversed, research using fetal tissue will now proceed and with funding from the taxpayers' money.
"As expected, HHS Secretary Xavier Becerra, a fanatical advocate for abortion, announced the Biden administration will now force American taxpayers to pay for barbaric experiments using the body parts of aborted babies," commented Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council.
"Instead of using ethical and effective alternatives, Biden is choosing to reinstate a policy that traffics in the grizzly remains of what would have been our next generation."
"The Biden administration is making it once again clear that it places no value on the inherent dignity of human life. Their actions deny the truth that every human life, born and unborn, possesses inherent dignity and deserves to be treated with respect," Perkins added.
In agreement, Liberty Counsel founder and chairman Mat Staver said that it is "unconscionable" to use taxpayers' dollars to fund "human genocide."
"People should never be forced to violate their conscience and sincerely-held religious beliefs to pad the pockets of those who profit from trafficking baby body parts," he added.
Connor Semelsberger, Director of Federal Affairs for Life and Human Dignity at Family Research Council, was saddened that President Biden seems to be promoting the condemnable practice of using remains from aborted babies for research.
"Proponents of aborted fetal tissue research willingly compromise ethics in the name of 'science.' However, the ends do not always justify the means," he said.
According to FRC's Fetal Dignity State Policy Map, twenty-three states are working to defund abortion providers using taxpayer dollars. As of August 2020, Texas is the only state that have attempted to defund abortions and abortion providers in Medicaid, Title X and state appropriations. Arkansas, Arizona, Florida, Indiana, Louisiana, and Mississippi have good laws in place to also defund abortion. Alabama, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan, Missouri, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, and Wisconsin have only partial defunding laws.
Alaska, Colorado, Delaware, Georgia, Minnesota, Montana, Nevada, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Dakota, Virginia, West Virginia, Wyoming merely enacted a state Hyde Amendment. FRC assessed that these have not taken any significant step to defund abortion providers.
The remaining 13 states: California, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Mexico, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Vermont, and Washington have reportedly taken steps to directly fund abortions and abortion providers using taxpayers' money.
The trafficking of baby body parts was first exposed by Sandra Merritt who did an undercover journalism work at Planned Parenthood. She was criminally charged and prosecuted for exposing Planned Parenthood's sickening trade.
