In March 2005, the UN adopted a Declaration on Human Cloning. Attempts had been made since 2001 to explore a UN Convention on Human Cloning; however, agreement could not be reached, so a non binding Declaration was adopted.
This in itself is an example of how opinion on human cloning has been divided. When the declaration was adopted, the vote count was: 84 nations in favour, 34 nations against and 37 absentions. (Source: United Nations Website).
The UN declaration on human cloning called governments across the world to:
Prohibit all forms of human cloning inasmuch as they are incompatible with human dignity and the protection of human life, prohibit any genetic engineering techniques "that may be contrary to human dignity"; and to take the measures (including legislative measures) necessary to implement those prohibitions. (Source: Genomics Gateway)
Whilst the Declaration appears to take a fairly hard line stance on the issue, I think it remains open to interpretation. To preserve human dignity may mean to use embryos in order to cure life threatening diseases, or, to not undertake research where there is a risk of embryos being destroyed.
As the Declaration on human cloning is not legally binding, in certain countries, it may be legal to clone humans to treat infertility and for other purposes (Michael Jackson2 here we come!). Although this has not been evidenced, if it is legal to do in other countries how can the law in any one country be enforced? If parents used a treatment facility in another country to have cloned embryos implanted, what would stop a clone being born in Australia? Maybe firstly, we should be asking, really, can a human be cloned successfully?? And the only way we can really explore this is if we find out more about our favourite Scottish Sheep, Dolly. It’ll tie in nicely with my trip to Edinburgh!!!
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