A US Senate committee last week approved legislation that would prevent insurers and employers from using genetic test results. The decision follows several years of debate about the issue, and builds on an executive order signed by President Bill Clinton in 2000, which barred federal agencies from using genetic information...
Restrictions imposed by President Bush on embryonic stem (ES) cell research in the US have 'outraged' Senators on an Appropriations Health Subcommittee. Republican Senator Arlen Specter and Democrat Senator Tom Harkin discovered that the restrictions prevent federal funds being used for research on newly developed ES cell lines that may...
Canadian scientists have identified a mouse gene involved in sperm development, which they say could help research into human male infertility and into contraception. The researchers, based at the University of Toronto, found that mice lacking the Fkbp6 gene had no spermatids, the cells that grow into sperm. The team...
More individual US states are taking independent action on cloning legislation while no law has been passed federally. Last week, the Louisiana house criminal justice committee considered a bill that would ban cloning for any purpose in the state. Currently, Louisiana state law bans cloning for reproductive purposes only, while...
An all-party parliamentary group on infertility was launched last week in the UK. The group, which will operate on a temporary basis to collate a report for presentation to the Department of Health, is to be chaired by Kevin Barron MP. The report will be timed to follow publication of...
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Shoddy judgement from law lords
On March 13, in possibly one of the shoddiest legal judgements this country will ever read, the Lords ruled against the ProLife Alliance. Human cloning has now been formally legalised for the first time in the Western World, thanks to an interpretative stratagem, which completely bypasses the need for a...
The end of genetic discrimination in the US?
by Juliet Tizzard
The United States Senate is to pass a new law preventing insurance companies and employers from using genetic tests to deny insurance coverage, raise insurance premiums or make hiring and other employment decisions. A compromise bill was passed last week, a few days after a Senate committee gave it its...
Donor anonymity vs identity: the views of parents
by Dr Clare Murray
There have been increasing calls for openness surrounding gamete donation over the past ten years and the UK Government is soon to decide whether gamete donors will lose their right to anonymity. If donors are to be identifiable, it will be the first time that donor conception offspring will have...