Ben Carson Defends Past Research of Aborted Fetal Tissue

Carrie Dedrick | Updated: Aug 14, 2015

Ben Carson Defends Past Research of Aborted Fetal Tissue

Presidential candidate and retired neurosurgeon Dr. Ben Carson has been accused of studying tissue from aborted babies. The Christian Post reports that medical blogger Dr. Jen Gunter said Carson was one of four authors of a research paper based on tissue samples from a nine-week and 17-week abortion. 

The paper was published in 1992. 

Pro-life Republican Carson responded to the accusation, saying that his role in the research was not studying the fetal tissue. 

In a Fox News interview, Carson said, "Well I have not actually worked with fetal tissue. The left has put information that I have done research on fetal tissues because my name appears on an article in which the pathologists compared specimens that I deliver from the operating room to fetal tissues. My part is to do the operation and supply the tissue. At that point, I move on the next operations. To suggest that I am in the laboratory actually doing the research or retrieving fetal tissue is nothing but propaganda."

Carson said he is not opposed to using fetal tissue that already exists in a tissue banks for research. 

"To not use the tissue that is in a tissue bank, regardless of where it comes from, would be foolish. Why would anybody not do that?" Carson said.

The presidential candidate told The Washington Post that fetal tissue research does not conflict with his pro-life views. 

"You have to look at the intent. To willfully ignore evidence that you have for some ideological reason is wrong. If you're killing babies and taking the tissue, that's a very different thing than taking a dead specimen and keeping a record of it,” he said. 

Publication date: August 14, 2015



Ben Carson Defends Past Research of Aborted Fetal Tissue