Doctors Say Nothing Will Stop Child-Cloning Effort

Richard Boudreaux / Los Angeles Times 10mar01

Rome -- In a scientific forum punctuated by shouting matches, three doctors from the United States, Italy and Israel told critics yesterday that nothing can stop their plan to create cloned children, and they said that more than 600 infertile couples have already signed up.

The would-be pioneers disclosed little new information about their semi- secret project, first announced six weeks ago, and spurned the idea of submitting to ethical or scientific oversight by any government.

"Some claim that we're moving too fast. They are right," Dr. Avi Ben- Abraham, an American-Israeli biotechnologist, told the crowds at Umberto I Policlinic, Rome's largest hospital. "We are moving as fast as we can think, as fast as we can imagine, (but) we are proceeding with the utmost responsibility."

The team is led by Dr. Severino Antinori of Italy, who has already pushed the boundaries of fertility treatment by helping women become pregnant in their late 50s and early 60s. The other participants are Dr. Panayiotis M. Zavos, an American reproductive physiologist, and Ben-Abraham, a practitioner of cryonics -- which involves freezing people at death in the hope that science will one day resurrect them.