LONDON — Britain moved Tuesday toward allowing scientists to create humans from the DNA of three people.
The technology aims to liberate future generations from inherited diseases, but critics say it crosses a fundamental scientific boundary and could lead to “designer babies.”
The U.K.’s House of Commons voted 382-178 in favor of legislation to license these experiments. If approved in the House of Lords, Britain would become the first nation to allow genetic modifications in human embryos.
“This is a bold step to take, but it is a considered and informed step,” Health Minister Jane Ellison told the Commons.
The technology is completely different from that used to create genetically modified foods, where scientists typically select individual genes to be transferred from one species to another. But critics say it crosses a line, because changes made to embryos will be passed on to future generations.
The protests are “about protecting children from the severe health risks of these unnecessary techniques and protecting everyone from the eugenic designer-baby future that will follow from this,” said David King, director of the secular watchdog group Human Genetics Alert.
The technology involves altering an embryo before transferring it into a mother with defects in her mitochondria, the energy-producing structures outside a cell’s nucleus.
Scientists say more than 99 percent of the DNA in the resulting child would come from its parents, with a tiny fraction coming from the donor egg.
