On Tuesday February 3, the UK House of Commons voted in favor of legalizing mitochondrial donation. The British press headlined it the next day, and the rest of the world’s media then caught on that this was a Very Big Deal. The Associated Press report noted critics’ fears that it would lead down a slippery slope. Supporters on both sides of the pond including experts on either side and UK ministers strongly rejected that idea.
Really? We didn’t have to wait a week.
On Sunday February 8, British newspapers reported that Shoukhrat Mitalipov of the Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU), who pioneered a variation of the techniques in question, had asked the FDA for permission to start clinical trials of it in order to treat age-related infertility.
Here’s the fun part: Mitalipov told The Independent that “We hope [the UK vote] will help in the US, and hopefully the FDA will move faster.” In response, said the UK Telegraph:
if the technology was made available to infertile women in America, there would be growing pressure for Britain to follow, experts said.
Bioethics Professor John Harris not only supports the idea (he supports pretty much everything techno) but insists that this is not a slippery slope.
Here’s the real fun part: Just two days later, on February 10th, Science Insider reported that Mitalipov was collaborating with disgraced Korean stem cell scientist Hwang Woo-suk, a claim that he later refuted.
Presumably, Mitalipov did not actually intend to provide an illustration of the slippery slope. But it’s hard not to see it.
Read full, original article: Mitochondrial Mission Creep and the Cloning Connection
