What is the regulatory framework governing therapeutic cloning in Canada?
• The Assisted Human Reproduction Act (2004) prohibits the creation of embryos for research purposes. The Act defines a human clone as: “a result of the manipulation of human reproductive material or an in vitro embryo, contains a diploid set of chromosomes obtained from a single — living or deceased — human being, foetus or embryo” (Article 3) and specifies that human cloning for any purposes, including therapeutic cloning, is prohibited. • The Updated Guidelines for Human Pluripotent Stem Cell Research (2007) of the Canadian Institutes of Health research states that “research involving somatic cell nuclear transfer into human oocytes (cloning) or involving stimulation of an unfertilized egg to produce a human embryo (parthenogenesis) for the purposes of developing human embryonic stem cell lines or other cell lines of a pluripotent nature” would not conform to the guidelines (Art. 8.2.2).
