CGS-authored

To the Editor:

Re "Cloning Creates Human Embryos" (front page, Feb. 12):

Therapeutic applications of embryo cloning - still a distant promise - cannot be developed without first overcoming significant research hurdles with embryo stem cells derived from non-clonal embryos. Sadly, abortion politics have impeded much of this stem cell research.

Moreover, many scientific companies involved in commercializing embryonic stem cell research have acknowledged repeatedly how impractical it would be to develop therapies from stem cells derived from clonal embryos.

The news from South Korea underscores once again the critical need for both an effective global ban on human reproductive cloning and better information about fertility drugs used during egg extraction.

It is a myth that these drugs have been adequately studied and that reasonable informed consent is possible.

Finally, because embryo cloning is the gateway to genetic modifications that go far beyond medical treatment into the realm of designer babies, we need a much broader discussion of this contentious issue.

JUDY NORSIGIAN
Exec. Dir., Our Bodies Ourselves
Boston, Feb. 12, 2004