Whats the difference between using animal clones and other kinds of biotechnology techniques?
Speed and efficiency. You could take cells from an animal, grow them in the laboratory and make very precise genetic changes — it’s called gene targeting — which you insert in the cloned offspring. So, for example, you put into the cells of the offspring DNA sequences which would say, “Don’t make this particular milk protein, but instead make clotting factor 8,” which is needed for hemophilia. You can do that now, but by using a much more primitive technique. Cloning and gene targeting requires fewer animals. It will be quicker, which means new health products will come on line more quickly. There’s another major advantage. Presuming this technique with sheep will successfully extend to cattle and then to pigs, it will speed xeno-transplantation — using organs from pigs to treat human patients. That can be done now, but what happens now is that you put a human protein into the pig organ which kind of damps down the immune response in the transplant patient. Now with gene targeting,
