Dr. Eugene Gu, a 30-year-old surgical resident at Vanderbilt University, is on the verge of his second major scientific breakthrough.
While doing side research as a surgical intern in 2014, Gu became the first person to successfully implant the heart and kidney of a human fetus into a rat. The organs actually grew inside the rat and sustained its life ― a result that could have enormous implications for the treatment of life-threatening birth defects.
This is the 21st century! Instead of studying cells in a dish, like Louis Pasteur used, why dont we have a whole human heart? Gu said in a phone interview, his voice crackling with excitement. Having a whole organ working for you ― beating, surviving, growing ― thats really powerful in science. It has a potential to cure a lot of diseases.
Gu, who was awarded a prestigious Howard Hughes Medical Research Fellowship when he was only 25, says his ultimate goal is to transplant healthy fetal organs in utero to babies with fatal congenital diseases, so they can survive to adulthood with fully functioning hearts and kidneys. He also hopes to grow human organs in animals that biomedical researchers could then use to develop cures for heart disease, the leading cause of death in the world, and end-stage renal failure, the No. 1 reason patients are on transplant waiting lists.
I want to someday end the organ donor shortage, he said.
But Gus research hit a snag in April of this year when two armed United States marshals banged on the door of his studio apartment. It was 10 a.m, and Gu had been sleeping off an all-night trauma surgery shift at Vanderbilt hospital. He had no idea why the police would be at his house and he was afraid to let the marshals in.
I know my rights, Gu told the marshals. Im not going to open the door unless you have a warrant.
We dont need a warrant, one of the men replied. This is a congressional subpoena.
The subpoena had come from the House of Representatives Select Investigative Panel On Infants Lives, led by Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.). Gus start-up research company, Ganogen, is one of more than 30 organizations being investigated by House Republicans over the use of fetal tissue from abortion clinics.
Gu obtains the organs he uses in his research from StemExpress, a company that accepts fetal tissue donations from abortion providers and supplies it to biomedical researchers. Republicans in Congress have been on a mission to outlaw the practice, which they describe as selling baby body parts, since an anti-abortion activist produced a series of heavily edited sting videos on Planned Parenthood working with StemExpress in 2015. Planned Parenthood says it sometimes donates, but does not sell, fetal tissue for medical research after an abortion at the request of the mother. The family planning provider is then reimbursed for the costs of transporting and preserving the tissue, which is explicitly allowed by federal law.
Still, Gus association with StemExpress put him in the cross hairs of anti-abortion politicians, who demanded to see his emails, records of every financial transaction Ganogen made, names of all of his employees, and any equipment or material he purchased with regard to fetal tissue research.
A spokesman for the House panel said the goal of the investigation is to protect the integrity of research, scientific advancements, and voluntary organ donation in America.
As you know, at the core of our investigation is a federal statute that prohibits the sale of fetal tissue for a profit, he said. Evidence uncovered by our Panel reveals that the unethical and potentially unlawful practices of some bad actors, like StemExpress, may be putting important scientific research at risk. Since Ganogen was listed on documents produced to our Panel as a customer who purchased fetal tissue from StemExpress, we subpoenaed the company for information that is pertinent to our effort to get all the facts.
But Gu said the negative attention from Congress has created a harrowing ordeal for him. Fellow surgical residents at Vanderbilt became suspicious of him. He said one colleague compared him to Martin Skrelli, the deeply hated pharmaceutical executive who had to testify before Congress after he acquired the manufacturing license for a life-saving anti-parasitic drug and raised its price by 5,556 percent. Gus academic evaluations turned negative, after years of near-perfect grades, and he says the doctors he was observing in surgery became more demanding and critical of him.
Outside of school, anti-abortion activists began to harass him on social media and send him angry notes.
Hows your beating baby heart business going @Ganogen_Inc @eugenegu? tweeted David Daleiden, the activist behind the Planned Parenthood videos.
I felt under siege, Gu said. Im just trying to save peoples lives, and now Im being thrown into this abortion fight as a proxy. I have nothing to do with abortion, I dont encourage abortion ― I just use tissue that would otherwise be discarded. And now Im painted as this baby killer just for doing research as a medical student.
Whats worse, he said, is that the Panel on Infants Lives is actually undermining what he believes could be a groundbreaking medical breakthrough.
All this controversy and opposition from the Republicans is stymying my research in a pretty significant way, he said, which is kind of weird because the scientific community is supposed to be immune to political shenanigans and oppression.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/eugene-gu-research-congress_us_581a3d79e4b01a82df6460de
