Modified Human Embryos : Dutch Government next in line
Just after the appalling news of US scientists creating Half-human, Half-animal embryos for the so-called “research” purposes, now it’s time for the Dutch researchers.
The Dutch government announced that it wants to allow growing human embryos for scientific research, thereby giving hope to parents struggling to conceive. They also assured that these embryos would be kept “under strict and limited conditions”.
The health ministry said in a statement that Dutch Health Minister Edith Schippers “wants to allow the creation of embryos for scientific research — and under very strict conditions to give people the possibility of (healthy) children.”
“The research has to do with infertility, artificial reproduction techniques and hereditary or congenital diseases,” the statement added.
It also specifically included people who became infertile after being treated for cancer at an early age.
The Netherlands will change its laws on embryonic research, which until now only allowed tests to be conducted on leftover embryos procured from in vitro fertilisation processes.
The statement further added that the so-called “14-day rule”will be strictly followed. This rule says that human embryos cannot be cultured in the lab for more than two weeks.
“Until now
the ban on the cultivation of embryos have hampered research which could help with the treatment of diseases on the short to medium-long term,” it added.This included various hereditary illnesses such as mitochondrial diseases, which affect cells in the body.
Britain this year granted its first research licence to genetically modify human embryos to a project that will help women who battle to fall pregnant.
The decision made Britain one of the first countries in the world to grant this type of authorisation on one of science’s new frontiers and follows months of deliberation by the country’s embryology regulator.
US-based scientists earlier this month reported they had grown human embryos in the lab for nearly two weeks, for the first time challenging the 14-day rule simply because no one had succeeded in keeping the embryos alive for that long.
The scientists then destroyed the embryos in order to avoid breaching the two-week limit.
So, now the point to think is that are these artificial embryos really going to help people and change someone’s life or are these scientists just trying to play God and like every failed experiment causing a disaster, will this too lead to another one, the creation of a monster.
Sleep over it!
Read : Chimeras : A Boon or a Doom | US Scientists create Half-human, Half-animal Embryos
