THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, October 26, 1994 TAG: 9410260454
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MARIE JOYCE AND DIANE TENNANT, STAFF WRITERS
DATELINE: NORFOLK LENGTH: Medium: 71 lines
For a few hours, the Jones Institute for Reproductive Medicine gained international fame for its plans to clone a human being.
There's only one problem, institute officials say: The story, reported on a network news program Monday, isn't true.
Officials at Eastern Virginia Medical School are miffed about the ``NBC Nightly News'' report that said the school's institute planned to clone a human embryo ``by the end of this year.''
School officials say that while the procedure - splitting a human embryo - is technically feasible, they have not even begun serious discussions about performing it.
``The truth is, we're not doing it at all,'' said school public affairs director Sheila Edelheit, whose phone was ringing by 8 a.m. Tuesday with press inquiries from places like the Netherlands, Japan and Australia.
NBC News stood by the story late Tuesday.
``It's 100 percent accurate as we reported,'' said Heidi Pokorny, press manager for ``NBC Nightly News'' in New York.
Edelheit said NBC science correspondent Robert Bazell visited Norfolk several weeks ago, researching technology in reproductive medicine. The Jones Institute's pioneering work in in-vitro fertilization was responsible for the 1981 birth of the country's first so-called ``test-tube'' baby.
Bazell interviewed Jones Institute president Gary D. Hodgen about the possibility of splitting a human embryo formed in a dish as part of the in-vitro procedure.
The two-cell embryo can be split to create two embryos with identical genetic information - a test-tube identical twin. The procedure is sometimes used now to breed cattle and other livestock.
Hodgen said the same technique could theoretically be used to help infertile couples. ``It would be worthy of serious consideration to use that technology to assist them in having a child or identical twins,'' he said, according to a transcript of the NBC broadcast.
He was in Berlin on Tuesday and could not be reached for comment.
Dr. William E. Gibbons of EVMS said Wednesday that the technique could be used to improve the chances for a successful in-vitro pregnancy. In-vitro involves fertilizing eggs in a lab, then implanting them into a woman's uterus. Doctors usually use three embryos - created from different eggs and sperm - to increase chances that one will settle in and grow, said Gibbons, chairman of the school's department of obstetrics and gynecology, which includes the Jones Institute.
Cloning more embryos would not be difficult technically. But the concept is so fraught with ethical considerations that EVMS doesn't want to touch it right now, Gibbons said.
Edelheit said the confusion apparently arose from a last-minute telephone interview between Hodgen and Bazell.
According to Edelheit: ``Bazell said, `Could you do this?' Gary said, `We could be doing this by the end of the year. Anybody could.' ''
Bazell told viewers this:
``Doctors at the Jones Institute in Norfolk, Virginia, are planning to make a laboratory copy of a human being - to clone an embryo. . . . They say they will do it by the end of this year. The director . . . wants to clone embryos to help infertile couples have babies.''
Bazell ended with this note:
``For now, the 300 or so in-vitro fertilization clinics in the U.S., including the Jones Institute, are virtually free of state and federal regulation. And using private money, they can do almost anything they want, including attempting to clone human beings.''
Gibbons said of NBC: ``I just think they made an honest mistake.'' by CNB