Posted on 04/13/2002 5:09:08 PM PDT by Pokey78
A FORMER associate of Severino Antinori, the controversial Italian fertility expert, has revealed his own plans to create cloned children for a dozen couples this summer. Dr Panayiotis Zavos also disclosed that he had severed relations with Antinori after differences over how to approach cloning. Despite continuing controversy over Antinori’s claims last week that one of his patients was eight weeks’ pregnant with a cloned foetus, Zavos plans to pursue his own project — even though there is widespread concern that the technique could lead to severely malformed children. Zavos hopes to implant his first cloned embryos at two secret locations by August. Based in Lexington, Kentucky, he has described 2002 as “the year of the clone”. In addition to himself and Antinori, the Raelians, a religious cult, also claim to have cloned embryos and plan to produce cloned babies. Zavos, who heads the Andrology Institute of America, said this weekend: “The status is looking good, and we’re ready to execute. We have selected the final 10 or 12 couples, and it’s a matter of time now. But you must realise this is a very sensitive area, and we must proceed very carefully.” Last August, Zavos and Antinori appeared together before a panel at the National Academy of Sciences in Washington to defend their plans. However, Zavos said that he broke away from the Italian professor five months ago. He declined to give detailed reasons but said: “I worry a great deal about Severino and the way he is approaching the subject.” A source close to the team said: “No one from the original team works with him any more. No one trusts Severino and no one can make science with him.” Zavos was sceptical over Antinori’s claim earlier this month in comments to a Middle Eastern news agency to have made a woman pregnant with a cloned foetus. Antinori gave no evidence to support his claim. “We very much doubt what Severino has done,” Zavos said. Zavos’s own credentials have also been questioned by scientists given that he was dismissed from a hospital for alleged unethical behaviour in 1994. Zavos is likely to be using the most common method of cloning animals, in which a nucleus is taken from a cell of a male. It is then transferred to an egg cell from which the nucleus has been removed, and the resulting embryo is implanted into the mother’s womb. Antinori declined to comment this weekend. But last week, in an interview with an Italian magazine, he said that his patient, thought to be a rich Arab, would give birth to a “completely healthy” baby and that 85% of its genetic make-up would come from the father and 15% from the mother.
Italy Doctor Says Three Cloned Pregnancies Exist PUSH HERE
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