Cloning

On July 9, 2001, Physician's Weekly printed an article regarding the outlaw of reproductive cloning on humans and whether or not congress should ban it. U.S. Rep. James Greenwood took a strong stance opposing reproductive cloning while Mark D. Eibert chose to explain why reproductive cloning should be legal, primarily, if not, solely to the 12 million Americans affected by a disease known as infertility.

Representative Greenwood argued that this practice would not be safe or ethical for someone to consider. Greenwood stated that Dolly the sheep had nearly 300 miscarriages, deformities, and birth defects, which might be acceptable for sheep but not for humans. In his mind a caring society cannot condone that level of human suffering, especially when given the fact that primate studies have not been conducted or cloned animals studied over their lifetimes. He later states that cloning would also be unethical and that no one has the right to create a human as a replica. Greenwood also expresses concerns of psychological effects of being cloned as a replacement for someone else.

Mr. Eibert, on the other hand, claims that it should be the right of every American to have biological children and to make reproductive decisions without government interference. The Supreme Court ruled that it would be unconstitutional for the government to decide which children are "perfect" or "politically acceptable" enough to be born. He also says that clones will not be a direct replica of the original person. They will have there own identity: fingerprints, personalities brain structures and IQs. This evidence is supported by the study of "natural" clones, or twins. The element of "nurture", or the environment in which the child is raised, will also separate the child's identity from that of its parallel.

However, when evaluating the arguments it is clear both have very different ideas of what cloning will be used for. Rep. Greenwood seems to think that cloning will be used to "replace someone else", while Mr. Eibert envisions cloning as being used to compensate for infertility issues among couples. Greenwood's argument, however, seems to have a few holes in it that should be addressed.

He states the cloned animals have not been studied over their lifetimes. Dolly the sheep, a clone, was studied by many different research teams its entire life, thus negating one