Expand Right to Try, Ban Fetal Stem Cell Therapies

New Hampshire's HB 1292 does two things at once, and both matter. It expands the state's existing Right to Try Act to cover patients with qualifying severe illnesses, not only the terminally ill, giving more suffering patients a legal pathway to access promising experimental treatments before federal approval is complete. For families who have exhausted conventional options, this expansion can mean the difference between hope and none.

The bill also explicitly addresses regenerative stem cell therapies, permitting their use under the Right to Try framework while categorically prohibiting any therapy derived from aborted fetuses or human embryos. This prohibition is not incidental language. It is a clear, enforceable guardrail written directly into state law, with the source of the prohibition grounded in the bill's own legislative findings invoking the sanctity of human life.

Those findings are worth reading carefully. The bill calls for treatments sourced from ethically obtained cells, naming adult stem cells and umbilical cord blood as acceptable sources. This reflects a coherent and consistent life ethic: genuine therapeutic innovation is possible without destroying human life at any stage, and the law should say so plainly. Science and conscience are not in conflict here.

From a faith-informed perspective, this bill honors the dignity of two distinct groups: the severely ill patient who deserves every legitimate chance at healing, and the unborn human life that must never be treated as raw material for another's benefit. A law that protects both is not a compromise. It is a principled application of the belief that every human life has inherent worth.

The American Council urges support for HB 1292. It advances compassionate care for the vulnerable, establishes enforceable pro-life protections in state statute, and demonstrates that New Hampshire can lead on both medical access and the ethics of human life simultaneously.