Clone a person before they forbid it!
Forgotten Clones
In Russia, it has been possible to copy people for two and a half years
Kira Vasilyeva, Novye IzvestiaThe State Duma has received a bill proposing to extend the ban on human cloning in our country.
The previous law, which imposes a taboo on such experiments, ceased to operate in June 2007, but this seems to have been forgotten. And since then, scientists, in fact, have not been forbidden to grow clones in laboratories. However, the deputies assure that everything was under control, and they hope that "moral restrictions" would not allow our geneticists to conduct such experiments.
In 2002, our country legislated a five-year ban on human cloning, as well as on the import into and export from Russia of cloned human embryos. The law then prescribed that "with the accumulation of scientific knowledge in this field, the definition of moral, social and ethical norms when using cloning technologies" the ban can be lifted.
In 2005, a special UN declaration called on the world community to ban all forms of such actions to the extent that "they are incompatible with human dignity and the protection of human life." The UN insisted on the immediate adoption of relevant national laws. But in Russia, it seems, they forgot to extend the ban on the creation of human clones, which expired in our country on June 23, 2007. They realized only now, and not the deputies, but the government. It has submitted a bill to the State Duma, which intends to extend the temporary ban "until the entry into force of the law establishing the procedure for the use of cloning technologies."
In the explanatory note, there is a reminder that such experiments "are still the subject of serious discussions in society," that the technology of human cloning has not yet been "finally developed," and the issues of "biological safety of human cloning" are still being discussed. "Human cloning meets with many legal, ethical and religious problems that currently do not have an obvious solution," the document admits. It turns out that, despite all this, human cloning experiments have not been formally banned in our country for two and a half years. And what is not prohibited by law is, as you know, allowed.
It is not known for certain whether clones were grown all this time in Russian laboratories. Similarly, it is difficult to say that geneticists continued to conduct experiments only on animals, without encroaching on the "stamping" of their own kind. The State Duma Committee on Health Protection assures that "no one has had time to take advantage of the gap in legislation." "Although there was no law, but the situation was under control," Oleg Kulikov, a member of the committee, told NI.
The deputy explained, firstly, "there are not so many institutions in the country that own such technologies," and, secondly, "there are also certain moral restrictions."
"Knowing scientists, people who are close to this topic, I can say that their self-control and self-restraint are sometimes higher than the requirements imposed by the law. After all, if there are no internal restrictions, then the law plays a secondary role," Mr. Kulikov philosophically noted. One way or another, and, according to the people's deputy, it is too early to legally allow human cloning in Russia, since even the long-term consequences of such experiments have not yet been determined." "As a result, we can release a product that will be dangerous for society. We have not made any progress in cloning animals yet. There is an evolution in the development of any scientific research: from simple to complex. We still need to work on a simple one," Mr. Kulikov summed up.
Meanwhile, the scientists themselves argue like this: if a person could be cloned like this in two years, it would have been done long ago, "because in many countries there is no ban on it at all." Artur Isaev, Director General of the Institute of Human Stem Cells, did not rule out that "theoretically, one of our scientists could take advantage of the moment" to conduct such experiments. "But in practice it was unlikely, because there are a limited number of specialists in Russia who could do this," he told NI. In addition, the scientist sincerely wonders who could have come up with the idea of illegally cloning people when "you can freely do everything else related to cloning" (to conduct experiments on animals, to create cells). "I have no information that someone took advantage of this," Artur Isaev concluded.
Eternal Youth Portal www.vechnayamolodost.ru01.12.2009