Regulating the future

In this interview, Juliet Tizzard of the HFEA explains the difference between embryo research and embryo treatment. This separation is what allows research on genome editing to develop in the UK.

The UK is almost unique in this way, as many countries around the world have not made this distinction, and so they have not allowed genome editing for research.

This distinction allows new techniques to be developed in the laboratory, so that it can be tested and safeguarded, and is one of the ways in which the HFEA is able to support novel research in the area of gene editing and other fields.

For discussion: If you come from a country other than the UK, please share how you think this technology would be received in your country. In doing so, please explain why you think it would be received in that way.