Washington, DC (LifeNews.com) -- A new Gallup poll sponsored by CNN and USA Today finds the level of support for using taxpayer funds for embryonic stem cell research on the decline. The poll has a majority of Americans backing federal funding, which is out of step with other surveys showing the opposite.

The new Gallup poll, conducted in early August, finds 56 percent the federal government should "fund research that would use newly created stem cells obtained from human embryos." Forty percent say the government should not fund such research.

But those numbers are changed from a May 2005 poll Gallup conducted which showed 60 percent favoring federal funding and 33 percent opposing it. The level of support has dropped 4 percent while the level of opposition has risen seven percent.

In the new poll, weekly churchgoers were more likely to oppose federal funding of the unproven research than those who seldom or never attend church. Conservatives were more likely to oppose embryonic stem cell research funding than moderates and liberals.

Other polls show a majority of Americans do not want their tax dollars used to pay for embryonic stem cell research, which has yet to cure a single patient.

A May 2005 poll by International Communications Research, found 52 percent oppose federal funding of embryonic stem cell research while just 36 percent support it.

In an August 2004 poll conducted by Wilson Research Strategies, 53 percent of respondents said that they opposed “using tax dollars to pay for the kind of stem cell research that requires

The new Gallup poll surveyed 1,004 adults from August 5-7 and has a 3 percent margin of error.