The Forum Editor,

The Straits Times,

390, Kim Seng Road,

Singapore 239495

Dear Sir,

NO HUMAN CLONINGS and EMBRYO

EXPERIMENTS, PLEASE

We refer to Dr.Gabriel Oon’s article, “Treat human embryowith respect”(ST,31/7/2001), and the “US ‘No” to humancloning embryos”(St,2/8/2001)

As lay people, we are gladto read the succinct message  in Gabriel Oon’s article about the value of human life, and therespect needed to be given to the embryo, living or dead.

We agree that from the time of conception, until  death, there is a dignity  and preciousness of human life, which must be protected..Vested-interested parties, who exploit the emotional   weakness of  women during pregnancy maysay such unkind words, as “a few cells is not human life” are also insulting . Surely if thisconception is not a human life , what then is she carrying ,- a non-humanbeing? It is naïve and obvious, that if we leave the pregnancy alone , a baby will be born after nine months! Wedon’t need any science to say that this is not so. This is a fact oflife.!!!

“ Similarly ,can a society beso heartlessly as to say, “It is OK to kill the helpless, so that we canuse their organs and cells for “experiments to benefit mankind” ?Many of us who lived in the hell of the second world war remember the inhumane human experiments done onhelpless, and defenceless prisoners. Memories of the macabre humanexperimentations by Japan andGermany, have led the latter toban the destruction of human embryos, and both countries ban human cloning.

Rightly, the US has outlawed all cloning of human embryos , including those for medical research., and levies severepenalties for violators. At least twenty countries , have banned human cloning. They include,Belgium, France, Italy, Spain, Japan,Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Portugal, Ireland, Norwayand Poland. Several of these countries have also bannedany form of research that destroys human embryos(Herald Tribune,4-5/8/2001).

As Singapore moves into being a gracious and more caringsociety”, we should not be labelled as a country where our industry isdeath.. We should also be more caring and help the25,000 mothers who, emotionallydistressed during pregnancy, aborttheir babies annually. We need to have more care givers, and have facilitiesfor looking after these womenduring pregnancy crises. If we can have good facilities and families who canadopt these children, and love them like their own, we would not need to gooverseas ,to adopt children, andaccept abortion as the only option..

Is it not time for Singapore to follow the lead set by other majorcountries, and ban human cloning, and the creation of human embryos for destruction?.