Oct 23, 2014 03:58 AM
http://www.theguardian.com/science/2014/...al-disease
EXCERPT: Parents of baby with fatal mitochondrial disease say techniques being considered by select committee could prevent them having another seriously ill child... They feel that ignorance about genetics has led to objections from some quarters. Holliday said the term “three-parent baby” that is sometimes used to describe the technique for avoiding the mitochondrial mutation is “hugely exaggerated”.
“A child would carry our genetic DNA that gives it all of our characteristics. To me, it would feel like having a complete blood transfusion or having an organ replaced.”
“[The term] is just incorrect,” she added. “What people don’t understand is that the law, if it is going to be changed, is not for nuclear DNA, but for mitochondrial DNA. All of the child’s characteristics are contained in nuclear DNA.”
EXCERPT: Parents of baby with fatal mitochondrial disease say techniques being considered by select committee could prevent them having another seriously ill child... They feel that ignorance about genetics has led to objections from some quarters. Holliday said the term “three-parent baby” that is sometimes used to describe the technique for avoiding the mitochondrial mutation is “hugely exaggerated”.
“A child would carry our genetic DNA that gives it all of our characteristics. To me, it would feel like having a complete blood transfusion or having an organ replaced.”
“[The term] is just incorrect,” she added. “What people don’t understand is that the law, if it is going to be changed, is not for nuclear DNA, but for mitochondrial DNA. All of the child’s characteristics are contained in nuclear DNA.”