Mr. Speaker, I thank the member for his speech. I know that he is a member on the Standing Committee on Health and that he has worked very hard with the other committee members on their report tabled in the House in December. They came to a very balanced approach to many complex issues.
My first question is quite brief. I have not met an individual, a group or an organization opposed to stem cell research. I wonder if the member can confirm whether he is aware of anyone at all who is opposed to stem cell research.
The second question concerns fertility clinics. In the Toronto Star on March 9, Dr. Françoise Baylis, whom I think the member is familiar with, gave an interview in which she said that:
Canada's fertility clinics are probably storing somewhere around 500 embryos in cryogenic deep freeze. Some belong to couples still trying to have children and some are needed for training and testing. Perhaps 250 “surplus” embryos would be available for stem-cell research.
Based on experience, roughly half would survive being thawed. Of these 125 surviving embryos, no more than nine could be expected to progress all the way to generating some sort of stem-cell line. Fewer still [about five] would meet the exacting scientific criteria to qualify for human embryonic stem-cell research.
What that means, according to Dr. Françoise Baylis, a member of the governing council of the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, is that only 2% of embryos would qualify for or meet the quality control standards or the guidelines required for research. Does the member believe that this technology, which would provide only 2% of those embryos to be destroyed that would be useful, is an acceptable practice?