Photo courtesy of Louis Reed/Unsplash
First baby with DNA from three different people born in the UK
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In the United Kingdom
the first baby was born with DNA of three people from a mitochondrial donation (MDT) treatment approved in 2015 in the country, which is a pioneer in regulating the process.
The UK Human Fertilization and Embryology Agency (HFEA) reported that 32 patients have been approved for the treatment so far.
This type of procedure is intended for women who are at high risk of transmitting a mitochondrial disease. The treatment allows them to have biological children without passing the disease on to their babies.
In the UK, only people with severe forms of the condition can have the procedure after undergoing analysis and approval by the HFEA.
The procedure
to achieve that Treatment
Doctors use them mitochondria an egg from a healthy donor to replace the part carrying harmful mutations from the mother’s gamete. With the two methods approved in the country, the donor material corresponds to less than 1% of the child’s final genetics, so she has no legal claim to it infant and must remain anonymous.
“With both techniques, the embryos are created using your nuclear genetic material (the genes that make you who you are) and donated healthy mitochondria,” explains the HFEA.
The Newcastle clinic became the first licensed center to provide the treatment in 2018, having already received more than 30 permits. However, no births using this method have been published, but after a survey by The Guardian newspaper, the HFEA confirmed that the first baby had been born.
The company also said that a total of “less than five” had been registered as of April this year, but did not provide any further data, saying it “could lead to the identification of an individual to whom the HFEA owes a duty.” Confidentiality”.
regulation
Although the United Kingdom was the first country to regulate the practice, the world’s first birth was registered through the TDM process in Mexico, as announced on September 27, 2016.
American scientist John Zhang’s team from New Hope Fertility Clinic performed the procedure in New York, United States and created five embryos, but only one developed normally.
At that time, he sent the embryo to Mexico, where it was placed in the uterus of a mother who had genes for Leigh syndrome, a mitochondrial disease thought to be fatal. The child was born months before the announcement and without any illness.
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