Clone doctor ready to begin

By ANNE BESTON science reporter

A human clone may be only weeks away, confronting the world with a major scientific and ethical dilemma.

In the face of fierce opposition from fellow scientists, Italian fertility specialist Dr Severino Antinori yesterday reaffirmed his determination to push ahead with plans for the first human clone within weeks.

Even if his experiments fail, scientists believe someone will create a human clone, probably within 10 years.

But many renowned scientists say human cloning is unethical and Dr Antinori's experiments are likely to lead to dead or deformed babies because the techniques are not advanced enough.

The breaching of the frontier of human reproduction is forcing humanity to confront the most basic of ethical dilemmas as scientific advances collide head-on with beliefs about the sanctity of human life.

Dr Antinori, the flamboyant embryologist sometimes known as "Dr Miracle", and his American partner, Zavos Panos, appeared before a high-powered United States scientific panel yesterday to explain their plans, sparking a storm of international protest.

The normally staid National Academy of Sciences, an independent panel of international scientists which is gathering information on the science and ethics of human cloning, descended into chaos as Dr Antinori faced a barrage of questions from his peers and reporters.

The silver-haired 55-year-old was even mobbed by journalists outside the toilet, and heated debate raged in the corridors after the meeting.

At the same meeting, another organisation, Clonaid, claimed it had already started the process of cloning a human.

Clonaid was founded by the Raelian Movement, which believes extra-terrestrial beings created humans by genetic engineering.

Spokeswoman Dr Brigitte Boisselier said human genetic material had been transferred into an empty egg, which had developed into an embryo.

But most of the attention yesterday focused on Dr Antinori, who achieved international notoriety when he helped a post-menopausal 63-year-old to give birth in 1994.

He claims to have 200 women ready to take part in the experiment, which could happen in a secret location or even on a ship in international waters because of the ban on human cloning in some countries.

While none of the women is thought to be from New Zealand, there is nothing in law here to stop New Zealanders taking part.

Any clone would be a 99.9 per cent copy of the male parent but not an exact replica because some genes would come from the woman's egg.

Because the donor cell implanted in the egg is from a male, the cloned child could only be a boy.

To create a cloned human, Dr Antinori will probably use technology similar to that which created Dolly the sheep in 1996.

But Dolly's creator, Ian Wilmut, said that despite producing some healthy animals, cloning resulted in mistakes and deformities that would be regarded as "inhumane in humans".

Alan Colman, research director of PPL Therapeutics in Scotland and the man who led the team to create Dolly, said: "The bottom line is practice makes perfect. But is it ethical to practise on humans? I think it isn't."

Many religious leaders oppose tampering with human life. In Italy, Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger claimed that Dr Antinori was trying to "emulate Hitler".

"Copying children, for reasons other than treating sterility, is Nazi madness."

The process Dr Antinori plans to use, like that of reproducing Dolly, involves transferring the nucleus from a body cell (containing thousands of genes and a full set of paired chromosomes) into an unfertilised woman's egg which has had the nucleus removed. The egg and donor cell are then fused, using a short electrical impulse.

For sheep, these embryos are then cultured for five or six days and those that appear to be developing normally (usually about 10 per cent) are implanted into a foster mother.

Dolly was created from a batch of 277 reconstructed eggs, but only 29 were fit to be placed in surrogate mothers. One gave rise to Dolly 148 days later.

Since Dolly, scientists have reported cloning cattle, mice, goats and pigs but attempts to clone rabbits, rats, monkeys, cats and dogs have so far failed.

The Roslin Institute, which carried out the Dolly experiment, says the success rate remains low in all species and only about 1 per cent of "reconstructed embryos" lead to live births. Many cloned offspring die late in pregnancy or soon after birth from respiratory and cardiovascular problems.

Miscarriages and abnormally large foetuses are common and it is not yet known if Dolly's biological clock began at zero or six, the age of the cell donor.

Dr Harry Griffin of the Roslin Institute said: "There is evidence of healthy clones, but there would have to be a lot more evidence of normality in a number of different species before you could claim the technique was safe for use in women."

Yesterday, scientists in New Zealand had no doubt a human clone would be created.

"I think he [Dr Antinori] genuinely means it. I think we are taking him quite seriously. If it was idle threats, people wouldn't be so worried," said Dr Ingrid Winship, associate professor of clinical genetics at the University of Auckland Medical School.

She said the dangers of the technology were unacceptable.

Dr Peter Hurst, a reproductive physiologist at Otago University, said the feeling within the international scientific community was that a human clone was almost inevitable.

"Somebody is going to do it, unfortunately, and I think the reason they will do it is simply to be first."

Feature: Cloning humans

Professor Severino Antinori

Human Cloning Foundation

bioethics.net

Religious Tolerance looks at cloning