U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., will discuss the future of the National Institutes of Health, stem cell research and other issues in a forum tomorrow. The event is the first in a series of health-policy forums at the medical school.

Specter, a senior member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, has joined bipartisan support of legislation to allow therapeutic cloning research to continue. He has lobbied the Bush administration to change its policies that have severely curtailed stem cell research.

Policies in place today allow federally funded research only on existing stem cell lines, which are considered to be limited in value.

Specter is chair of the Labor, Health and Human Services appropriations subcommittee, which oversees NIH funding. With his support, the NIH budget has doubled in recent years. In last year’s budget debate, he partnered with Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., to attempt to add $1.8 billion to the Bush administration’s NIH budget request.

The forum will begin at 9:45 a.m. in the Clark Center auditorium. Specter had been scheduled to visit in November 2003 but congressional scheduling changes prevented him from making the trip.