BRITAIN: A British regulatory authority has issued its first licence allowing researchers to begin cloning human embryos. The permit allows scientists to grow embryos then dissect them to recover stem cells, but no embryo will be allowed to grow for more than 14 days.
Many medical researchers have welcomed the go-ahead from the UK Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA), but the move was strongly condemned by pro-life campaigners.
Researchers at Newcastle University in northern England will be allowed to create embryos as a source of stem cells. They will be used in medical research aimed at curing diseases, a spokeswoman for the university said.
"It has taken a year of work, and I am most pleased that the HFEA has recognised the potential of this technology in modern medicine," Newcastle University's Dr Miodrag Stojkovic said in a statement.
Similar research here would almost certainly be blocked by the Constitutional protections for the unborn, although it could require a test case in the courts.
Experimentation on embryos from whatever source is also banned by ethics guidelines agreed by the Irish Medical Council, although these only apply to doctors registered with the Council.
The Government established an advisory group, the Commission on Assisted Human Reproduction, headed by Prof Dervilla Donnelly. The Commission is preparing a major report to advise on in vitro fertilisation, embryo research and related issues. Its report is overdue but expected some time this year.
The Newcastle scientists said they plan to duplicate early-stage embryos and extract stem cells from them with the aim of developing new treatments for degenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and diabetes.
The embryos will be destroyed before they are 14 days old and will never be allowed to develop beyond a cluster of cells the size of a pinhead. Such therapeutic cloning is permitted under HFEA controls but cloning to create human babies is illegal in Britain and most western states.
The ability to create cloned embryos relies on a technique perfected by Prof Ian Wilmut and colleagues at the Roslin Institute, Edinburgh. This group cloned the first large mammal, Dolly the sheep, who died at the age of six years.
Embryonic cloning has become an issue in the US presidential election. President Bush has already blocked Federal funding for embryonic research and has turned his face against it. However, the Democratic Party hopeful, Mr John Kerry, has already declared his support for ongoing stem cell research.
President Bush's move has given Britain a competitive advantage in this complex research area, but it will be years before medical treatments will flow from this research.
It could take up to a decade to bring new treatments into hospitals, according to Prof Andrew Green - director of the National Centre for Medical Genetics at Our Lady's Hospital, Crumlin, and professor of medical genetics at UCD - speaking on RTÉ.
"This research will give new insights which will ultimately enable medical scientists to develop new treatments for many debilitating diseases," stated Prof Chris Higgins, director of the Medical Research Council Sciences Centre at Imperial College London.
Prof John Harris, Sir David Alliance Professor of Bioethics at the University of Manchester, said: "The HFEA are to be congratulated on licensing this important research proposal.
"Therapeutic cloning will in the immediate future be a vital tool in harnessing the power of stem cells to treat some of the major diseases which threaten humankind. This decision is a signal of our society's compassion and concern for those threatened by disease."
Prof Jack Scarisbrick, national chairman of the pro-life group Life, described the move as a further step down a "slippery slope".
He said: "Therapeutic cloning involves the manufacture of a new kind of human being, one generated without parentage in the normal sense, with the express purpose of destroying that life once stem cells have been stripped from it.
