mrz
10-12-03, 14:02
Amerika has a point, en ik besef me ineens iets. :o
Global therapeutic cloning ban averted
11:50 10 December 03 NewScientist.com news service
A global ban on all medical applications of human cloning was averted by an eleventh-hour deal at the United Nations on Tuesday. Last-minute haggling in the aisles of the UN General Assembly in New York sealed a compromise which postpones debate on a cloning treaty until October 2004.
A total ban, backed by the US, the Vatican and other Catholic countries, would have caused a deep rift with nations such as the UK and the Netherlands that want the right to pursue new medical treatments from cloning.
All countries want a UN treaty that will ban the creation of cloned human babies. But a US-backed proposal put forward by Costa Rica sought to extend the ban to "therapeutic" cloning. This aims to use stem cells from cloned embryos to treat diseases such as Parkinson's disease, but requires the embryo to be destroyed.
The issue appeared to reach a stalemate in November when the UN's legal committee voted by 80 to 79 to postpone further debate on the treaty until 2005. But Costa Rica rekindled the crisis this week by proposing a vote in the General Assembly. This aimed to overturn the legal committee's decision and then put the original proposal for a total ban to a direct vote.
In the end, both sides backed down as neither was confident enough of winning. But the last-minute deal did bring forward the resumption of the debate by a year.
"Outright abuse"
Although there was relief among backers of therapeutic cloning that a total ban was averted, the legal tactics used by Costa Rica and the US to force the issue attracted sharp criticism.
"I regard what the US was trying to do in the UN as an outright abuse of the international legal system," said Ronald Green, who chairs the cloning ethics review board of Advanced Cell Technology, a cloning company in Worcester, Massachusetts.
Representatives of at least 66 scientific societies had also attacked the Costa Rican ploy in a statement issued by their umbrella body, the InterAcademy Panel.
Bob May, president of Britain's Royal Society, said that some countries had attempted to "rush through a ban that would not respect the right of individual countries to reach their own decisions about whether to outlaw therapeutic cloning".
The controversial issue comes up for debate again next week, this time in the European Parliament. It will vote on a directive that could ban therapeutic cloning throughout the EU.
Andy Coghlan
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99994471
Global therapeutic cloning ban averted
11:50 10 December 03 NewScientist.com news service
A global ban on all medical applications of human cloning was averted by an eleventh-hour deal at the United Nations on Tuesday. Last-minute haggling in the aisles of the UN General Assembly in New York sealed a compromise which postpones debate on a cloning treaty until October 2004.
A total ban, backed by the US, the Vatican and other Catholic countries, would have caused a deep rift with nations such as the UK and the Netherlands that want the right to pursue new medical treatments from cloning.
All countries want a UN treaty that will ban the creation of cloned human babies. But a US-backed proposal put forward by Costa Rica sought to extend the ban to "therapeutic" cloning. This aims to use stem cells from cloned embryos to treat diseases such as Parkinson's disease, but requires the embryo to be destroyed.
The issue appeared to reach a stalemate in November when the UN's legal committee voted by 80 to 79 to postpone further debate on the treaty until 2005. But Costa Rica rekindled the crisis this week by proposing a vote in the General Assembly. This aimed to overturn the legal committee's decision and then put the original proposal for a total ban to a direct vote.
In the end, both sides backed down as neither was confident enough of winning. But the last-minute deal did bring forward the resumption of the debate by a year.
"Outright abuse"
Although there was relief among backers of therapeutic cloning that a total ban was averted, the legal tactics used by Costa Rica and the US to force the issue attracted sharp criticism.
"I regard what the US was trying to do in the UN as an outright abuse of the international legal system," said Ronald Green, who chairs the cloning ethics review board of Advanced Cell Technology, a cloning company in Worcester, Massachusetts.
Representatives of at least 66 scientific societies had also attacked the Costa Rican ploy in a statement issued by their umbrella body, the InterAcademy Panel.
Bob May, president of Britain's Royal Society, said that some countries had attempted to "rush through a ban that would not respect the right of individual countries to reach their own decisions about whether to outlaw therapeutic cloning".
The controversial issue comes up for debate again next week, this time in the European Parliament. It will vote on a directive that could ban therapeutic cloning throughout the EU.
Andy Coghlan
http://www.newscientist.com/news/news.jsp?id=ns99994471