Fetal gene therapy inches closer. Will embryo editing follow?

BOSTON — Over the past year, I’ve begun hearing rumblings from scientists who secretly think it’s time to stop being stodgy about editing the genes of human embryos.

For the most part, they are still too timid to speak up publicly — and no doubt mindful of the fate of China’s once-jailed embryonic gene editor He Jiankui. But after I published an interview in March with Cathy Tie, He’s ex-wife, one researcher sent me a surprising text in support of tweaking these tiny masses of cells that are just starting their journey into human form.

“I would love to see us take a more liberal approach to that. Totally agree that it’s more humane to cure the disease earlier vs later,” Michelle Lynn Hall, the co-founder and general partner of the life science fund Entrée Bio, told me. “I think there could be a market for bleeding edge stuff like that in the IVF world.”

There are a lot of good reasons why the embryo editing box has remained shut among the scientific establishment. But few things that are possible...