Panel’s paper on cloning under attack

Date: 05/06/1997

By Leyla Linton

ANIMAL rights campaigners and Green MEPs have joined forces in condemning a report compiled by a panel of scientific, legal and ethical experts on the ethical issues raised by cloning.

Both have attacked the group's conclusion that the cloning of animals is ethically acceptable if carried out with strict regard to animal welfare, its aims and the methods used are ethically justified, and genetic diversity is preserved.

The Greens are furious with the group for suggesting that animal cloning could have medical, agricultural and economical benefits. German MEP Hiltrud Breyer said cloning was always cruel to animals and was contrary to their dignity and uniqueness.

Although the report by the EU's group of advisers on the ethical implications of biotechnology said human reproductive cloning should be condemned - as should any attempt to create genetically identical embryos for clinical use in assisted reproduction - Breyer said that allowing animal cloning was the first step on the slippery slope to tolerating the cloning of humans.

She called for the European Commission to act on the panel's proposal for public consultation throughout Europe.

David Wilkins, president of the Eurogroup for Animal Welfare, also believes that the Commission should launch a much wider debate on the issue.

His organisation opposes all forms of genetic engineering and cloning. “Animal cloning can never be ethically justified,” he said, although he conceded that there could be some benefits to human and animal health.

But Alastair Kent, president of the European Alliance of Genetic Support Groups, welcomed the report as “helpful and balanced”.

He added that the group's opinion was reassuring

“Scientists are not beavering away in Frankenstein labs coming up with Saddam Husseins. Science is not going to surprise us,” he said.