William B. Neaves, Ph.D. [President and CEO, The Stowers Institute, Kansas City, MO]: "The Stowers Institute is pleased that a majority of citizens voted for the Missouri Stem Cell Research and Cures Initiative on Tuesday. Our attention will now be directed toward further recruitment of the world's leading scientists to the Stowers Institute, including stem cell researchers. The support shown by the voters of Missouri in the hope science represents for the future of our state will help the Stowers Institute for Medical Research compete globally for the highest echelons of scientific talent.

We are grateful to the dedicated staff of the Missouri Coalition for Lifesaving Cures and hundreds of coalition volunteers; to the more than 100 patient and medical groups that joined the coalition; to the tens of thousands of individual coalition members; and to the hundreds of thousands of Missourians who supported the ballot initiative — they have ensured that the important research of Stowers Institute scientists can continue in the great state of Missouri. The success of Amendment 2 enables the Institute to plan for future growth beyond the anticipated full occupancy of the current facility estimated to occur in 2008 or 2009."