The First Clone
Scientists have finally cloned a human embryo. The breakthrough promises cures for terrible diseases. Here's the inside story:
The source of the hysteria is a widespread misunderstanding of just what an early embryo is, according to West, Cibelli, and Lanza. "If you ask the average person, they will tell you it's a tiny little person with buggy eyes," says West. "But, in fact, these are just a few reproductive cells, not much different than eggs or sperm. They are the raw materials of life, but they are not a person."
Most scientists agree. During the first 14 days after an egg is fertilized, the group of cells is known as a "preimplantation embryo." In nature, the majority of these pass from the body without ever attaching to a woman's uterus and developing further. If one truly believed that these were individual human lives being lost, argues Ronald Green, director of the Ethics Institute at Dartmouth and chairman of ACT's bioethics committee, then this should be considered a huge public-health crisis, and there would be a massive medical campaign launched to save these "lives." Moreover, these preimplantation embryos often split off to become two or more entities or, conversely, two groups of the cells sometimes merge together. And currently, there are an estimated 1 million of these early embryos left over worldwide from in vitro fertilization procedures, poised to be discarded.
Religious leaders have changed their minds many times over the years about when life begins. Some religions say it begins at conception; some say after 40 days of development; others say at the "quickening," when fetal movement can be felt; and others say not until birth. An Episcopal bishop advised Judson Somerville that cloning his cells would not constitute creating a human being. "These are my cells being multiplied in a lab, not those of some other human being," concludes Somerville.
Still, the "pre-embryos," as many call them, if implanted into a woman's womb, do have the possibility of becoming a human being, which makes some ethicists uneasy about the idea of creating them in the first place. "Many people do not consider embryos to be human beings, but they are also not just another cell or bit of tissue," social critic Francis Fukuyama wrote in a recent Wall Street Journal essay. "Research cloning would get us accustomed to the idea that human life in its early stages should be treated like any other pharmaceutical product." Yet, because of advances in science, we are fast approaching a point when any given cell has the potential to be developed into a human being, given the right chemical tinkering. "To commit ourselves morally to protecting every living cell in the body would be insane," counters Green. "Research advances are making all cells `embryonic,' " adds Lanza. "But if you consider those cells a human life, then 100 souls are lost every time I sneeze."
All three men are adamant that they are following the most moral path. "Three thousand Americans die every day of diseases that therapeutic cloning could treat," says Lanza. "It would be wrong of us to abandon those people because we're afraid of controversy." West is even more graphic about his beliefs. "I feel as if all my loved ones are trapped in a burning building, dying of diseases like diabetes and heart disease," he says. "I have the fire extinguisher--the therapeutic cloning technology--that can save them, but people are trying to take it out of my hands." And Cibelli is disgusted with the brouhaha. "Therapeutic cloning has to be done, and soon," he says. "Patients are all waiting for the public to get over the hype and fearfulness so that they have a chance to live."
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