First cloned monkeys born in China

The first cloned monkeys made with somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT) were born recently, according to Chinese scientists.

Although Zhong Zhong and Hua Hua, two genetically identical long-tailed macaques, are not the world's first cloned monkeys, they are the first to be born using SCNT. This technique involves inserting DNA from one monkey into an enucleated egg of another to create an embryo.

Dr Mu-ming Poo, co-author of the research and director of the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Neuroscience, says that a population of genetically identical monkeys will be very useful for genetic research and drug development.

The… click here to read whole article and make comments





‘Deacon of death’ on trial in Belgium

Ivo Poppe in court   

A Roman Catholic deacon and nurse may be Belgium’s worst serial killer. Taking advantage of his work in a nursing home, Ivo Poppe, 61, may have killed up to 50 people by injecting air into their veins. The deaths took place between 1978 and 2011.

His last victim was his own mother, who was suffering from depression, but he also dispatched his stepfather and two uncles. He normally gave his victims an injection of Valium with a bubble of air, which caused an embolism.

Poppe’s trial began this week in the… click here to read whole article and make comments





First compensation claim for compulsory sterilisation in Japan

Old documents related to Japan's Eugenic Protection Law

A Japanese woman in her 60s is planning to sue the government over her forced sterilization under a 1948 law. This will be the first time that state compensation has been sought for sterilisation. The mentally disabled woman in Miyagi Prefecture was a teenager when she was forced to undergo the procedure.

Records of 2,700 people who were sterilized under the Eugenic Protection Law — which was in force until 1996 — have been found in local government archives, a development which could help victims seek state compensation.

Like… click here to read whole article and make comments





Is a dementia patient two different people?

from 'Reflections of the Past', a photo series by Tom Hussey 

Canada’s new euthanasia legislation does not permit binding advance directives. However, there is pressure to incorporate them into legislation. Supporters argue that some people choose euthanasia too soon because they fear lingering on in a demented state.

In an acute analysis of the situation in the blog Impact Ethics, Valentina Romano points out that the “legalizing dementia-related advance directives ... is problematic because the justification rests on the assumption that dementia patients are simpler, faded versions of the healthy persons they once were.… click here to read whole article and make comments





UK Parliament to debate conscientious objection

Baroness O'Loan, former Police Ombudsman in Northern Ireland  

A Northern Ireland peer has introduced a bill into the House of Lords to guarantee the controversial right to conscientious objection. Baroness Nuala O’Loan says that her Conscientious Objection (Medical Activities) Bill is needed to protect medical professionals:

Reasonable accommodation of conscientious objection is a matter both of liberty and equality: of individual freedom and social inclusion. No one should be coerced by the risk to their careers into violating their conscience, and it is plainly inconsistent with the principles of equality legislation to exclude whole… click here to read whole article and make comments





Another stem cell fraud in Japan

Nobel Prize winner Shinya Yamanaka has been dragged into a case of stem cell research fraud in his laboratory. This week Kyoto University found that the lead author of a 2017 paper in Stem Cell Reports, Kohei Yamamizu, had fabricated all six main images, which were “pivotal in the conclusions the author drew”.

Yamamizu is an assistant professor in a research group led by Yamanaka at Kyoto University’s Center for iPS Cell Research and Application. There is no suggestion that Yamanaka was involved, but apparently he has even considered resigning from his position.

“[The fraud] is something that shakes the… click here to read whole article and make comments





British surgeon censured for branding patients’ livers

Dr Simon Bramhall   

A British surgeon who branded the livers of two of his patients with his own initials has been fined £10,000 and ordered to perform 120 hours of community service. Dr Simon Bramhall, a liver, spleen and pancreas surgeon, admitted the two incidents, which occurred in 2013. His registration has not been suspended. He now works for the National Health Service in Herefordshire. 

Although he seared his initials into the surface of the liver, no physical harm was suffered by the patients. In sentencing the surgeon, the judge said:

“Both of the… click here to read whole article and make comments





Rebel doctors and hospitals still targeted by Assad regime

Syrian medical facilities have experienced a dramatic increase in attacks, particularly in opposition-controlled areas of Hama and Idlib, according to Physicians for Human Rights (PHR).

PHR has received reports of 16 attacks between December 26 and January 8, concentrated in southern Idlib and northern Hama, eight of which PHR has independently verified. Medical workers have confirmed with PHR that most, if not all, facilities in the areas affected by the recent bombing campaign have been forced to close down or are operating at a very limited capacity.

“We haven’t seen this many facilities targeted in such a short period of time… click here to read whole article and make comments





Singapore sticks with old-fashioned parenting model

A gay couple has created a conundrum for the Singaporean government by attempting to adopt a child born of an American surrogate mother. The two unnamed men, both Chinese, aged 45 with high salaries, paid a California woman US$200,000 to provide an egg and to gestate a baby, who was born in 2013.

Singapore has no law on surrogacy, but has forbidden commercial interest in adoption. On December 27, Judge Shobha Nair ruled that the two men could not adopt the child, leaving him in a legal limbo. In a stinging ruling, she declared that paying the surrogate mother… click here to read whole article and make comments





France opens national bioethics debate

This week France launched a six-month long national consultation on hot-button bioethical issues. The results, involving scientists, medical practitioners, lawyers and the public, will help to shape a revised bioethics law, perhaps later this year.

The list of topics is long: from legalizing euthanasia to the development of artificial intelligence to organ donation to surrogacy for gay couples to genetic engineering. Debate is sure to be passionate and highly political.

Under President Emanuel Macron, the government has promised to update France’s laws on assisted reproduction, which currently limit the practice to heterosexual couples. According to France 24, “The restrictive… click here to read whole article and make comments




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