The First Human Clones
May 30, 2008 5:33 pm ScienceThe first human clones will likely begin growing in wombs within a year. This procedure will be lead by scientist Panayiotis Zavos. A few groups claim they have already cloned humans. It’s possible that humans have already been cloned, but this will be the first public, verified, and wide-spread use of cloning.
Dr. Zavos runs one of the world’s leading invitro fertilization clinics. The cloning will be used to help infertile couples who want a child that shares their genes. There are around a 1000 couples on a waiting list for this procedure. He has already chosen which volunteers will undergo the first impregnation.
Embryos have already been cloned by Zavos and other groups. But, this will be the first verified account of cloned embryos developing into cloned babies.
The wall Zavos is currently blocked by is political rather than scientific. Both in the U.S. and Europe, governments are unwilling to give him permission. He has been meeting with leaders everywhere, and will carry out the procedure in whichever country gives him permission.
Below is a two minute interview of Dr. Zavos that was on CBS News. Unfortunately it is very uninformative, but it does give a face to the man who will be catalyzing socitie’s shift towards cloning humans.
This is a link to an extremely interesting documentary. It has interviews of Dr. Zavos and volunteers. It also brings political and ethical issus into light. The documentary is about 50 minutes long.
June 2nd, 2008 at 8:39 pm
After watching the documentary, I feel it would an important event, should Dr. Zavos and his team were to create a clone through pregnancy. I believe Zavos believes he would be helping infertile couples have children when they cannot do so by conventional methods. However, when Zavos states there is a 70% chance the human being may come out with abnormalities, I don’t think it would be the right thing to do. It’s not like he’s experimenting with an inanimate object- or animals as he has done in the past. This is a human baby, an innocent human life. If the baby is born with any type of defect, Zavos will be viewed as a monster. I will not view him this way but I will view him as a scientist that jumped the gun before he looked at all the angles of this “experiment”. Zavos and team should be more certain of what the outcome will be experimenting with an innocent human life.
Anyway, I’m glad you brought this story to light. It’s very controversial. It’s those non black and white issues that are the most interesting to talk about.