Carson: ‘I Have Not Actually Worked With Fetal Tissue’

Republican presidential candidate Dr. Ben Carson responded to a report that he did medical research on aborted fetal tissue by stating, “I have not actually worked with fetal tissue” on Thursday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “O’Reilly Factor.”

Carson, after defending his argument on Planned Parenthood that “one of the reasons that you find most of their clinics in black neighborhoods is so that you can find way to control that population,” said, [relevant remarks begin around 4:20] “Well, I have not actually worked with fetal tissue. The left has put out information saying that I’ve done research on fetal tissues because my name appears on an article in which the pathologist compared specimens that I delivered from the operating room to some fetal tissues, in an attempt to decide which way the cells were being differentiated. You know, my part is to do the operation and supply the tissue. At that point, I move on to the next operation. So, to suggest that I’m in the laboratory actually doing the research, or retrieving fetal tissue, is nothing but propaganda.”

Carson added, “all pathology departments will have a whole array of tissues, from day one of conception until 99 years old. And if you use the tissue — if you’re comparing or looking for a disease process in elderly people, does that mean you’re doing geriatric research on geriatric tissue? No. It means you’re looking at your tissue, and you’re making comparisons to derive information, and those fetal tissues, by the way, come from a variety of different places, ectopic pregnancies, spontaneous abortions, but just because they get the fetal tissue, does it mean they should throw it out? Of course they don’t. That’s how science is advanced.”

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