Birth of World's First Clone?
Eve?
Clonaid condemned by Dr Patrick Dixon
Press Association Human Cloning 27 December 2002
The birth of the world’s first cloned human
was condemned by British scientists today as another example of
the “sordid depths” to which maverick physicians will
sink. The claim by Clonaid announcing Boxing Day’s arrival
of a baby girl called Eve born by caesarean section, will prompt
“revulsion and disgust” throughout the world and will
see 2003 go down in history of mankind as the Year of the Clone,
Dr Patrick Dixon claimed.
See LATEST UPDATES ON THIS
HUMAN CLONING STORY - MORE BIRTHS CLAIMED - to couples from the
Netherlands, Japan and Saudi Arabia.
Dr Dixon, a leading expert on the ethics of human
cloning, described today’s news as “totally inevitable”,
with separate US and Chinese teams also claiming that they have
created large numbers of human cloned embryos for medical research.
(see below). He warned that it would all mark a watershed when
the world would suddenly realise that science is spinning out
of control. (See huge media
coverage of Dr Dixon's response).
“We don't know yet (27/12/02) whether the claim about Eve
is fact or fraud but one thing is clear. There’s a global
race by maverick scientists to produce clones, motivated by fame,
money and warped and twisted beliefs,” he said. “Today’s
announcement is totally inevitable and we can expect a number
of other births of clones to be announced over the next few weeks.”
He said that physicians across the world were propelled by “private
passions and weird emotions” with the determination to deliver
a cloned baby to any man or woman who wished to “duplicate
themselves or recover the dead”. The cloning industry, and
today’s announcement, was worth tens of millions of pounds,
he said. See BBC
TV News interview with Dixon
The Raelian Sect, who claimed responsibility
for the first human clone, insist that an independent inspector
will be employed to take DNA evidence from the baby and her 30-year-old
mother. (Editor: they then went back on that promise 7 days later).
Dr Dixon added: “The baby born has been
born into a living nightmare with a high risk of malformations,
ill-health, early death and unimaginable severe emotional pressures.
We should be very concerned for Eve 's welfare.
“Can you imagine what it will be like for a 12-year-old
daughter to look at her mother and realise she is seeing her own
sister? “For Eve to look at her own grandparents around
the Christmas table and to see her parents? Can you imagine what
kind of freak show she will be regarded as for her entire lifetime?
“What will it do to her sense of personal identity, knowing
that she’s only a copy of someone else who is much older?”
Dr Dixon said he had been contacted by many people
motivated by “selfish means”, struck by appalling
grief and wanting to bring their loved one back to life.
“They are trying to recover the dead. One person told me
how his 18-year-old handicapped son and died and he wanted to
know what he would have been like had he not been starved of oxygen
at birth.
“The only reasons people want to clone are for selfish reasons.
They are totally obsessed with their own right to have a clone
or to clone dead realtives, without any regard to the welfare
of the child, and this is the whole thrust of it.”
Dr Dixon claimed that although the baby had not
been born in Britain, if the claims turned out to be genuine,
it was probably British technology which had guided the process.
“The technology is well proven, not only in animals but
also in humans. Last year Advanced Cell Technology (ACT) in the
US announced they had successfully made the world's first cloned
embryos using human eggs. Indeed, the reason why UK parliament
gave a green light to proceed with legal creation of cloned embryos
was because they had been told by British cloners that it was
possible and important to do it for medical research.
(Note: Chinese scientists
announced end January 2003 that they had cloned 80 human embryos
of which 4 developed far enough to be implanted, before being
destroyed. )
“I said then that clones would be made in Britain or made
using British technology but would be born elsewhere.”
He now believes that Britain and the rest of the world will see
a significant number of new announcement about clones being born
over the next year.
The human cloning laws are still so ‘weak’ that many
couples, Dr Dixon fears, will legally conceive a
clone in a country which allows insemination of a cloned embryo
before returning to their country of origin for birth.
“This is a disaster waiting to happen because over 170 nations
in the world have yet to outlaw the birth of human clones and
many of the others are allowing the creation of human clones so
long as they are not put into a woman’s womb.
“This huge and powerful industry is pushing ahead to create
large numbers of cloned embryos, despite the fact that the medical
benefits may well be overtaken by a much more interesting process,
which uses adult stem cells
instead.”
The Raelian Sect, which claims 55, 000 followers
worldwide, believes that life on Earth was established by extra-terrestrials
who arrived in flying saucers 25, 000 years ago, and that humans
themselves were created by cloning. The sect, which formed the
company Clonaid in 1997 to produce cloned humans, said the birth
“went very well”.
“We are entering a new age: 2003
will go down in the history of humankind as the Year of the Clone,”
Dr Dixon said.
“It will be known as that watershed year when humankind
realised that science is running out of control, that mavericks
were locked in a fiendish race propelled by private passions and
weird emotions.
“As a result we will see a backlash, a public outcry against
the abuse of genetic technology. This will set back medical research
in many other areas by half a decade at least as funding dries
up and investors get nervous.”
He concluded: “Human cloning is a big business for the future.
This is about a big wadge of cash. We are talking about tens of
millions of reward for exclusive media rights to the story of
the first clones. We are also talking about significant numbers
of people who we know are willing to pay over $100,000 each to
clone themselves. Let’s not be deceived that this is all
about altruism.
“We in the UK have some soul-searching to do. We have just
about the most liberal cloning laws in the whole world.
“We could well see cloned babies being born in Britain or
arriving in Britain and they may well be to British couples.
America also needs to wake up fast, a country
where cloning laws are weak or almost unenforceable right now.
“We need an anti-cloning global agreement that human cloners
who make cloned babies will be outlawed, made pariahs of society,
hounded from place to place and never allowed to work in science
again.
“We must not allow people to inflict this terrible future
on any more children. We are probably already too late to prevent
the birth of what is going to be a small wave of human clones
because we know from other reports that there are a number of
women that may be about to deliver.”
Dr Dixon, who described the birth (if true) as
“the height of moral irresponsibility”, said he was
surprised that the cloned baby was born on Boxing Day and not
made to happen on Christmas Day amid a circus of media interest
and financial bids from publications for the first pictures.
“It’s just another example of the sordid depths to
which the human cloning industry is sinking.”
But he doubts whether this is the first cloned baby. “How
many others died, how many did they have to abort because they
had no arms, no ears or half a head? We know in animals for every
healthy clone they abort many, many others.”
Controversial Italian fertility doctor Severino
Antinori also claims he has engineered a cloned baby boy who will
be born in January.
So far, Scientists have succeeded in cloning
sheep, mice, cows, pigs, goats and cats.
Last year, scientists in Massachusetts produced
cloned human embryos with the intention of using them as a source
of stem cells, but the cloned embryos never grew bigger than six
cells.
Many scientists oppose cloning to produce humans,
saying to is too risky because of abnormalities seen in cloned
animals.
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