By
The Associated Press
LONDON - The House of Lords debated legislation on embryo research yesterday that would, if approved, make Britain the first country to legalize human cloning.
In an impassioned debate that continued into the night, many lords expressed concern that ethical questions were being sidelined in the rush to be at the forefront of medical research. They urged an amendment that would withhold approval until after ethical and scientific issues surrounding the research have been reviewed by a special committee.
Others urged giving scientists the go-ahead now, saying treatments developed through embryo research and cloning could revolutionize medicine, offering hope of transplants that would prevent or cure scores of illnesses, from Parkinson's disease to diabetes.
The government is seeking to relax the rules that limit medical research on human embryos under the 1990 Human Fertilization and Embryology Act, which strictly limits research on donated embryos to such areas as studies on infertility and the detection of birth defects.
The proposed changes, which passed the House of Commons by a wide margin in December, would expand the types of research allowed to include the potential of so-called stem cells - the unprogrammed master cells found in early-stage embryos that can turn into nearly every cell type in the body.
The Human Fertilization and Embryology Authority, which polices embryo research, has promised to consider cloning applications for some types of research, such as stem cell experiments. Those would inevitably involve cloning of embryos, because the goal is to treat patients with perfectly matching tissue transplants. Like all other embryos used in research, the clones would have to be destroyed after 14 days. The creation of babies by cloning would remain outlawed.
It is unlikely any legislation sanctioning the creation of cloned embryos for research would pass in the United States. President Bush opposes federal funds for research that involves destroying human embryos, and several bills aimed at outlawing cloning are at various stages in Congress.
Lord Alton of Liverpool, who proposed the amendment to set up a committee to review ethical and scientific questions, urged the lords to withhold approval.
"Since 1990, when miracle cures were promised for 4,000 inherited diseases, between 300,000 and half a million human embryos have been destroyed or experimented upon. There have been no cures, but our willingness to walk this road has paved the way for more and more demand," Alton said.
The government can override the unelected House of Lords when a bill is rejected. But in this case it cannot, because the proposal is not a new bill but a change in regulations set out in an existing law, which itself includes a clause requiring that any changes must be approved by both houses of Parliament.
If the lords vote down the proposal, the government must bring back a new version, which again must be passed through both chambers. That could delay the changes by months, possibly preventing the adoption of any new regulations before the next general election, expected in the spring.
An embryo is essentially a ball of stem cells that evolves into a fetus when the stem cells start specializing to create a nervous system, spine and other features - at about 14 days. Scientists hope that by extracting the stem cells from the embryo when it is three or four days old, their growth can be directed in a lab to become any desired cell or tissue type for transplant.
The hope is to one day grow neurons to replace nerve cells in a brain killed by Parkinson's disease, skin to repair burns and pancreatic cells to produce insulin for diabetics.
Scientists would remove the nucleus of a donor egg and replace it in a cell from a sick patient. The egg would then be induced to divide and start growing into an embryo. The cloned cells would be genetically identical to the patient's and therefore could theoretically overcome problems of transplant rejection, caused when the immune system fights foreign tissue.
"The human embryo has a special status, and we owe a measure of respect to the embryo," said health minister Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, who supports the proposed changes.
"We also owe a measure of respect to the millions of people living with these devastating illnesses and the millions who have yet to show signs of them. This is the balance we must make."
