WASHINGTON (Reuters Health) May 07.2001 - Physicians Announce Births of First Genetically Altered Infants

The world's first genetically modified infants have been born after women unable to conceive naturally underwent a new fertility treatment used by scientists at the Institute for Reproductive Medicine and Science of St. Barnabas Medical Center in West Orange, New Jersey, a researcher said last week.

The technique was used to produce 15 healthy babies, the oldest of whom turns 4 years old in a month, according to Dr. Jacques Cohen, scientific director of assisted reproduction at the institute.Dr. Cohen said his institute was the first to use the technique called ooplasmic transfer, but other fertility specialists had followed. He said another 15 babies had been born following the use of the technique at other facilities.Dr. Cohen dismissed criticism by some scientists who labeled the technique to be unethical because it results in children with genetic material from two mothers."I don't think this is wrong at all," Dr. Cohen told Reuters Friday. "And I think we have to look at the positive part here. I think this did work. These babies wouldn't have been born if we [hadn't] done this."In the technique, physicians use an egg from an infertile woman, a donor egg and sperm from the infertile woman's partner. The physicians then remove cytoplasm from the donor egg using a microscopic needle manipulated by robotic arms. The cytoplasm is then injected into the infertile woman's egg, along with the sperm for fertilization.The technique helps women with defects in their eggs to conceive. However, the method can introduce mitochondrial DNA from the female donor egg into >the mix of genetic material from the mother and father. Tests confirmed >that 2 of the 15 babies produced by this technique at their institute had genetic material from the birth mother, the father and the egg donor, Dr. Cohen said.The procedure, described in the British medical journal Human Reproduction, has raised ethical questions among some critics in the scientific community. This is "the first case of human germline genetic modification resulting in normal healthy children," Dr. Cohen and his colleagues write in the journal."This news should gladden all who welcome new children into the world. And >it should trouble those committed to transparent public conversation about >the prospect of using 'reprogenetic' technologies to shape future >children," Erik Parens of The Hastings Center in Garrison, New York, and Eric Juengst of the Center for Biomedical Ethics at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland commented in the journal Science.Dr. Cohen said the technique did not manipulate the genes, but merely added innocuous extra genetic material. "We haven't changed any genes," he said. "That's a huge step." However, the infants do have two different types of mitochondrial DNA, he added.Of the 15 infants produced by the technique used at the institute since >1997, 13 lived in the United States, one lived in Britain and another in France, Dr. Cohen said. The institute used the technique on 30 infertile women, he continued. Seventeen failed to become pregnant and one become >pregnant but miscarried. The remaining 12 women delivered infants, with >three of the women having twins."So far, from what we understand, they are doing OK," Dr. Cohen said ofthe infants. "And those two that had the mixed mitochondria, they're doing OK, too."

No government money was used in the research, Dr. Cohen added.