A genetically modified baby claim provokes international outcry

A Chinese scientist claims that he helped create the world's first genetically modified babies, binoculars born this month. This announcement caused shock and indignation among scientists around the world.

He Jiankui, a genome editing researcher from the Shenzhen University of Science and Technology, said that he had implanted an embryo in a woman. was edited to disable the genetic pathway allowing a cell to become infected with HIV.

In a video posted on YouTube, he explains that the girls are in good health and are now at home with their parents. Sequencing the genome of their DNA has shown that the revision works well and only modifies the targeted gene, he says.

The badertions of the scientist have not been verified by independent genome tests or published in a peer-reviewed journal. But, if true, birth would represent a significant – and controversial – leap in the use of genome editing. Until now, these tools are only used in embryos for research purposes, often to study the benefit of using them to eliminate mutations causing diseases of the human germ line. But reports of untargeted effects in some studies have raised significant safety concerns.

Documents published in the clinical trial registry in China show that he used the omnipresent CRISPR-Cas9 genome editing tool to disable a gene called CCR5, which forms a protein.

Fyodor Urnov, genome editing scientist, was asked to review the documents describing the badysis of the DNA sequence of human embryos and fetuses published on the gene CCR5 for an article in MIT Technology Review. "The data I've reviewed is consistent with the fact that the editing actually took place," said Urnov, of the Altius Institute for Biomedical Sciences, in Seattle. But he says that the only way to know if the genomes of children have been modified is to independently test their DNA.

Urnov challenges the decision to alter embryos to prevent HIV infection. He also uses genome editing tools to target the CCR5 gene, but his studies focus on adult cells rather than embryos. He says that there are "safe and effective ways" to use genetics to protect people from HIV without resorting to the editing of embryos. "There is currently no unmet medical need that treatment of embryos treats," he says.

"Today's report on changing the genome of HIV-resistant human embryos is premature, dangerous and irresponsible," says Joyce Harper, who studies women's health and reproductive health at University College London. Years of research are needed to show that interference in the genome of an embryo will not cause harm, she said. Legislation and public discussion are also needed before genomic editing is used on embryos to be implanted.

"This experiment exposes healthy children to the risks of gene editing without any really needed benefit," says Julian Savulescu, director of Oxford Uehiro. Practical Ethics Center of the University of Oxford.

Making genetically modified babies goes against the guidelines issued by the Chinese Ministry of Health in 2003, but does not violate any law.

He states that the couple had in vitro fertilization (IVF). , a procedure in which the egg of a woman is fertilized by the sperm of a man outside the body to form an embryo.When the embryo was only 39, a cell, he inserted an editing protein that deactivated CCR5 before implantation of the embryo in the mother.

The announcement of the first babies published on the genome was announced while field researchers were meeting at the occasion of a major international meeting on genome editing at Hong Kong, 27-29 November. One of the objectives of the summit is to reach an international consensus on how to proceed with genome modification to modify ova, sperm or embryos, called germline modification. Many field scientists felt that it was inevitable that someone would use genome editing tools to make changes to human embryos intended to be implanted in a woman and advocated the creation of ethical guidelines prior to the release of the first report.

] It approves the use of genome editing in embryos only in disease-related cases and states that genetic modifications to improve intelligence or to select characters such as hair color and eyes should be prohibited. "I understand that my work will be controversial, but I think families need this technology and I'm willing to accept criticism," he said.

Bioethicist Tetsuya Ishii, of Hokkaido University, also does not think that genome modification is applied embryos to reduce HIV infection is warranted. He explains that babies of HIV-positive mothers can be delivered by caesarean section to avoid transmitting the infection during childbirth.

In the case of twins, the father is HIV positive but the mother did not, he explains in the YouTube video. which means that there was a very low risk of transmission by the parents. However, in an interview with Associated Press, he stated that the goal of this work was not to prevent transmission by parents, but to provide couples affected by the HIV a chance to have a child likely to be protected from a similar fate. 19659006] Recent studies suggest that the public is in favor of modifying the genome of embryos if it corrects mutations causing disease. In July, the Nuffield Council on Bioethics, an independent advisory committee based in London, published a survey of 319 people. Nearly 70% of these have supported gene editing if it allows infertile couples to have children or if it allows a couple to alter a mutation causing disease in an embryo. A larger survey of 4,196 Chinese citizens released last month reported similar support for gene modification if the goal is to avoid an illness. But interviewees objected to its use to improve IQ, athletic ability or change skin color.

This story will be updated throughout the day.