An ‘epic scientific misadventure’: NIH head Francis Collins ponders fallout from CRISPR baby study
By Jon Cohen,
Science
| 11. 30. 2018
“Should such epic scientific misadventures proceed, a technology with enormous promise for prevention and treatment of disease will be overshadowed by justifiable public outrage, fear, and disgust. NIH does not support the use of gene-editing technologies in human embryos.”
A “profoundly unfortunate,” “ill-considered,” “epic scientific misadventure” that “flout[ed] international ethical norms” and was “largely carried out in secret” with “utterly unconvincing” justifications. Those are the words in a statement issued by Francis Collins, head of the U.S. National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland, in response to the claim by He Jiankui of the Southern University of Science and Technology in Shenzhen, China, that he used CRISPR to genetically modify two embryos, resulting in the recent birth of twin girls.
The scathing condemnation from the typically measured NIH chief, who has done landmark genetic research himself, came hours after He first described his work at the second International Summit on Human Genome Editing in Hong Kong, China, on Wednesday. “The need for development of binding international consensus on setting limits for this kind of research, now being debated in Hong Kong, has never been more apparent,” Collins wrote.
The next day, the meeting’s prominent organizing committee—convened by academies of science and medicine from the United States, the United Kingdom, and Hong Kong—issued its own statement about what it...
Related Articles
By Pallab Gosh and Gwyndaf Hughes, BBC News | 06.26.2025
Work has begun on a controversial project to create the building blocks of human life from scratch, in what is believed to be a world first.
The research has been taboo until now because of concerns it could lead to...
By Rhys Blakely, The Times | 06.24.2025
Scientists have created fertile mice from male genetic material alone, a breakthrough that could one day open the door to human babies who inherit their genes from two fathers.
The experiment, led by Professor Yanchang Wei at Shanghai Jiao Tong...
By Gina Kolata, The New York Times | 06.20.2025
A single infusion of a stem cell-based treatment may have cured 10 out of 12 people with the most severe form of type 1 diabetes. One year later, these 10 patients no longer need insulin. The other two patients need...