Aussie scientists, ethicists blast human cloning news

Australian scientists and ethicists have expressed dismay and disbelief at reports a woman is eight weeks pregnant with the world's first human clone.

The reports, which have stemmed from comments made by maverick Italian fertility doctor Severino Antinori at a lecture in the United Arab Emirates, have suggested a woman of unknown origin is carrying the clone of a wealthy Muslim.

Antinori, who in 1994 helped a 63-year-old woman have a baby through in vitro fertilisation, was quoted in UAE English-language newspaper Gulf News as confirming a woman had been impregnated with a clone.

"Our project is at a very advanced stage," he was quoted as saying.

"One woman among the thousands of infertile couples in the program is eight weeks' pregnant."

The professor has since refused to confirm or deny the reports, prompting global demands for clarification.

The deputy head of Monash Institute of Reproduction and Development's Centre for Early Human Development, Assoc Prof Martin Pera, said the Australian scientific community was uniformly opposed to reproductive cloning.

"The point is not whether he has had a success, but that he should not be doing it in the first place," Pera said. "It is unnecessary and unsafe."

Pera said that his stance would remain even if the medical hurdles facing the technology were overcome, saying there was no reason in his view for cloning as a reproductive tool.

"This is fundamentally different from having a child through other means. This is asexual reproduction."

Pera said claims by the Italian specialist that he could screen cloned embryos for all abnormalities were false.

"The number of abnormalities that occur in gene expression...there is a whole variety of things that can go wrong," he said.

"I don't think there's any way you could screen for all the defects that can occur."

Technology "not yet advanced"

Murdoch Childrens Research Institute ethics program director Dr Julian Savulescu said that while he was not opposed to reproductive cloning, the technology was not yet advanced enough to make it safe to proceed in humans.

Animal cloning studies have delivered a meagre success rate in the single figure percentages, with reports of gross deformities and abnormalities in miscarried, stillbirth and the few animals born live.

"I think it is outrageous and it could result in a child with severe mutations that kill it," Savulescu said.

He said many more animal experiments needed to be done before the technology was attempted on humans.

"At the moment it is too dangerous in humans, but if it were safe you have to ask if there is a good objection to it and, if so, why that objection doesn't apply to identical twins."

Savulescu argued that with appropriate regulations, cloning was a valid reproductive avenue for childless couples.

But Catholic Church ethicist Dr Nicholas Tonti-Fillipini said he was dismayed that the announcement opened the door for the creation of children without real genetic parents.

"I am dismayed because there's a child at stake here," Tonti-Fillipini said.

"Unless we take a stand on this issue, there is nothing to stop it from becoming common practice."

Meanwhile, Melbourne's Herald Sun newspaper has reported that an 85-year-old Perth man was considering visiting Antinori's Rome clinic to have a clone of himself created.

The retired mathematician, Frank Hansford-Miller, said his late wife could not have children and prostate cancer had prevented him from becoming a father.

Hansford-Miller told the paper he had about four women who were prepared to carry his clone to term.