Louisiana in tangle of cloning bills

The state Senate of Louisiana, US, has voted 29-8 in favour of legislation (bill SB 873) that would ban human cloning for both reproductive and research purposes, and impose criminal penalties of up to 10 years in prison and a $10 million fine. The vote comes only a week after the Louisiana Senate approved a bill (SB 74) that would ban reproductive cloning but allow embryos to be cloned for embryonic stem cell (ES cell) research (therapeutic cloning).

Earlier this month, the Health and Welfare Committee of the Louisiana Senate approved what is now bill SB 74, sponsored by state Senate president Donald Hines. It would have made reproductive cloning a criminal offence, subject to individual fines of up to $5 million and corporate fines of up to $10 million, but cloning to create embryos for ES cell research would have been allowed. As bill SB 74, it went to the full Senate for consideration, and was passed by 24 votes to 13. Hines also tried to add an amendment to the competing bill that reached the Senate at the same time (SB 873) to make therapeutic cloning legal, but failed by two votes, leading to there being two bills on the same issue, saying different things.

Both bills will now be considered by the state's House of Representatives, which has already voted this month to amend yet another bill banning all forms of cloning so that it allowed therapeutic cloning (bill HB 803). That bill was later withdrawn from consideration by its sponsor, Gary Beard. Hines' bill (SB 74) will be heard by a House committee on Wednesday, and the competing bill (SB 873), sponsored by Senator Arthur Lentini, will be heard within the following few days.

Talking about his bill, Lentini said 'I don't want to be on the cutting edge of something that destroys human life, no matter how many research dollars it brings to the state'. But Hines, commenting on the setback presented by the latest vote, said 'the medicine of tomorrow is going to be gene therapy and stem cell treatment. I don't want Louisiana to be left behind, and I don't want the little children of our state with diabetes to be left behind either'.