AS LEGAL rulings go, it is confusing in the extreme. In granting an injunction to two scientists who oppose widening US government funding for research on human embryonic stem cells (hESCs), Judge Royce Lamberth wrote of “simply preserving the status quo”. Yet his ruling could block all federally funded research on hESCs, through a controversial interpretation of a 1996 law that prevents federal money being used to destroy human embryos (see “Court freezes federal funding for embryonic stem cells”).
The law clearly rules out federal funds being used to create new hESC cell lines, but Lamberth argues that even…
