Director : Dr Donald Bruce
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Implications of Cloned Mice and the Dolly Confirmation
Bringing forward the possibility of cloning humans?
The cloning of mice greatly open up cloning research possibilities
The cloning of mice will mean many more animals being used in experiments
Since 1993, a working group of the Society, Religion and Technology Project (SRT) of the Church of Scotland has been examining ethical issues of genetic engineering. This inter-disciplinary group of experts includes Roslin scientist Dr Ian Wilmut, head of the team who cloned Dolly. The following short article is by the Director of the SRT Project, co-author of the book Engineering Genesis? - The SRT Study on Ethics and Genetic Engineering in Non-human Species, based on the group's work, published this September.
Articles in the scientific journal Nature in July proved beyond reasonable doubt that Dolly is indeed the world's first mammal
cloned from an adult cell, and that researchers in Hawaii have extended the Roslin Institute's technique of nuclear transfer to
adult mice.
This raises three key issues.
The extension of cloning to mice was something of a surprise since the received wisdom was that mouse nuclear transfer was unlikely, following the failure of experiments in the early 1980's. Together with another recent report that adult cows have been cloned, these results make it clear that this form of cloning is not just a peculiarity of sheep. If it occurs in species as diverse as sheep and mice, it is more likely to be general in mammals, and thus to be technically feasible in humans.
Bringing the possibility of human cloning closer places an even greater onus on the US Government to close its existing loopholes in its legislation, to outlaw any attempt at privately funded human cloning. They should now follow the lead of the Council of Europe, which added a legally binding protocol to its Bioethics Convention banning the cloning of human beings. This protocol is in line with UK legislation, but the UK, pioneer of this area of research, stands in some isolation for not yet having signed up to the Convention. It should do so without delay. There is now a worldwide recognition that to clone human beings would be both unethical and unsafe: from governments, professional medical bodies like the association of gynaecologists and obstetricians, and from bioethics committees of the EC and UNESCO. There is a basis for a worldwide ban.
Secondly, the extension of cloning to mice will open up a lot more possibilities for developing other cloning applications in animals and potentially in humans. It is much easier to work with mice than farm animals. Many more laboratories will now be in a position to jump on the cloning bandwagon, pushing cloning research forward much faster. This raises a question. What sort of research are we going to use it for? Despite the optimistic claims, it is not so simple as opening up cures for AIDS or cancer, and new developments in animals. There could certainly be many positive developments, but some applications would raise major ethical problems.
In animals, the report and motion of the Church of Scotland General AssemblyCloning in Animals and Humans supported Roslin's limited cloning application to genetically modified sheep, to produce medically useful proteins in their milk, but opposed the idea of its use in commercial animal meat production. In humans, everyone agrees it would be immoral to create cloned human beings just to supply spare part organs, but research might now enable human organs or cells to be created by reprogramming cells from a human embryo. Many would say that to create a human embryo for this purpose was equally unacceptable. Others would disagree. The Human Genetics Advisory Committee produced a useful consultation document on such issues, but these now need wider public debate, and public scrutiny on what research is to be allowed. The sky should not be the limit, now that research into cloning is likely to be much easier...
Lastly, opening up cloning research to mice will mean a using a lot more animals in research just at a time when the general trend in Europe is to reduce the number of animals being used and, where possible, to replace animals altogether. The EC funds a big programme looking for alternatives. There is thus a tension between two opposing trends. Care will be needed not to reduce mice to mere items in a research catalogue, and to remember that they, like us, are God's creatures.
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This page was created on 21 August 1998, and has been produced by the Society Religion and Technology Project of the Church of Scotland (SRT for short), and is copyright, Donald M.Bruce, 1998. We're usually happy for people to reproduce all or part of our articles, but please write or email us for permission first, at our address below.
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