• Question: Can we clone humans? Is we can is it right?

    Asked by olivia13 to Amy, Karen, Sarah, Will on 20 Jun 2012. This question was also asked by izzy2429.
    • Photo: Karen Reed

      Karen Reed answered on 20 Jun 2012:

      Nope – its illegal to try and clone a human – and even if it wasn’t I dont think we are quite there yet to get cloning to work for humans. We can clone other animals (like sheep, cows and mice) but technically humans are just a bit more complicated.

      We can clone just bits of humans though – e.g. taking some skin cells and treating them so that in a dish they can start to grow into other types of cells – its a very exciting new area of reaserch for many diseases, including for people from brain injury and disabilities due to spinal nerve damage. That said I don’t think we are quite there yet with those – but its been done successfully to restore sight to some people

    • Photo: Sarah Martin

      Sarah Martin answered on 20 Jun 2012:

      Hi olivia13,

      No, we can’t make babies out of the cells of a single human – nature always needs two! There’s also no convincing reason why we’d want to – what’s wrong with having two parents?
      And no, we’re also not allowed to.

      🙂
      Sarah

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