The Scottish institute that created a lamb known as "Dolly" from cells of an adult sheep is seeking international patents that it says would cover cloning of mammals - including humans.
Roslin Institute, which shook scientific foundations and generated both fascination and moral outrage worldwide with its successful cloning, confirmed its intention Thursday after a U.S. group said it was lobbying to stop the patents.The deputy director of the Edinburgh institute - which has insisted that it would not attempt human cloning - did not say why Roslin wanted the patent, but critics suggested it was to keep it out of the hands of others.
"Our (patent) applications do apply to use in animals," Harry Griffin told The Associated Press in a telephone interview. "But it is up to the relevant authority in each country to decide whether the term `animals' should include humans."
Asked if the institute intended to patent its process to include human cloning, Griffin said, "That was the intention."
The applications have been submitted to the World Intellectual Property Organization, a U.N. agency based in Geneva.
The Rural Advancement Foundation International, which has offices in Pittsboro, N.C., and Ottawa, said it will lobby a World Health Organization meeting in Geneva this weekend to stop the patents.
Roslin Institute scientists announced in February that they had created a cloned sheep, named Dolly, using cells from another sheep's udder.
It was the first time scientists had cloned an adult mammal, and the announcement provoked worldwide concerns, including about the potential for cloning humans.
"The ethics and fate of human cloning is not a matter to be entrusted to the Roslin Institute," the foundation said. "This is an issue of profound global importance and must be resolved at the highest levels."
The foundation said the institute reiterated that it did not intend to attempt human cloning, and that the institute was seeking the patent to stop others from pursuing it.
The foundation said it believes the institute. But it is concerned that PPL Therapeutics, the company collaborating with the scientific team that cloned Dolly, could sublicense the technology to three big pharmaceutical enterprises.