By Theodore Shoebat
Scientists in China are acting like they have just achieved some scientific greatness after they mixed the cells of an aborted monkey fetus with some other parts of monkey eggs, implanted hundreds of monkey fetuses and only managed to have two survive. They are calling these poor monkey survivors “clones.” This is all being pushed as propaganda to elevate scientists as some super geniuses. I did a video on this:
According to one report from BBC:
Identical long-tailed macaques Zhong Zhong and Hua Hua were born several weeks ago at a laboratory in China.
Scientists say populations of monkeys that are genetically identical will be useful for research into human diseases.
But critics say the work raises ethical concerns by bringing the world closer to human cloning.
Qiang Sun of the Chinese Academy of Sciences Institute of Neuroscience said the cloned monkeys will be useful as a model for studying diseases with a genetic basis, including some cancers, metabolic and immune disorders.
“There are a lot of questions about primate biology that can be studied by having this additional model,” he said.
Zhong Zhong was born eight weeks ago and Hua Hua six weeks ago. They are named after the Mandarin term for the Chinese nation and people.
The researchers say the monkeys are being bottle fed and are currently growing normally. They expect more macaque clones to be born over the coming months.
‘Not a stepping stone’
Prof Robin Lovell-Badge of The Francis Crick Institute, London, said the technique used to clone Zhong Zhong and Hua Hua remains “a very inefficient and hazardous procedure”.
“The work in this paper is not a stepping-stone to establishing methods for obtaining live born human clones,” he said.
Prof Darren Griffin of the University of Kent said the approach may be useful in understanding human diseases, but raised ethical concerns.
“Careful consideration now needs to be given to the ethical framework under which such experiments can, and should, operate,” he said.