Scientists: Stop Three-Parent Babies

N E W   Y O R K, May 18 -- Scientists are calling for the immediate regulation of fertility clinics to prevent the birth of any future gene-altered babies, the first of which was reported earlier this year.

In March, a team of fertility specialists at the Institute for Reproductive Medicine and Science of St. Barnabas, in West Orange, N.J., reported "the first case of human … genetic modification resulting in normal healthy children."

Fertility Method Creates Gene-Altered Babies

The group used a method that extracted cellular material from a donor woman's egg cell and transferred it into an infertile woman's egg. This material allowed the woman's egg to become fertile.

The donor egg contained DNA from mitochondria, little organs inside the cell that create the energy to do life's work. The group believes that problems with the mitochondria prevented the infertile women from becoming pregnant.

Mitochondria contain only about 0.03 percent of a cell's DNA, but that's enough that they can make copies of themselves when the cells divide. The other 99.97 percent of a cell's DNA comes from the nucleus and the 23 pairs of chromosomes.

The group says that transferring this mitochondrial DNA into the recipient eggs resulted in the birth of 30 babies, the first of which was born in 1997.

Extra Genes From Mitochondria

In March, the group reported for the first time in the medical journal Human Reproduction that genetic tests on two babies showed they had DNA from three parents: Two babies born with this method actually had mitochondrial genes from the donor mom, as well as chromosomal genes from the mother and father.

This extra-parental mitochondrial DNA could be transferred to the next generation.

Scientists in the latest issue of the journal Science are calling for the regulation of fertility clinics to prevent this practice from continuing.

"No research or clinical application involving humans should proceed that have the direct or indirect potential to cause inheritable genetic modification in either the public or private sector," unless it is reviewed by already existing federal regulators or a new body, wrote Mark S. Frankel and Audrey Chapman.