His name is Abrahim Hassan. He is the first baby in the world to be born having been designed by three “parents”. When he is old enough to go to school, the little boy can tell his classmates that he has a father and two mothers. Impossible ? No, this birth took place last April. It comes from a new technique consisting in using the genetic material of three parents, that is to say, a father and two mothers. The feat took place in Mexico, points The New Scientist who reveals the information.
This technique was performed to allow a mother to have a child without transmitting her disease, Leigh syndrome. This pathology is a rare inherited metabolic disorder that affects the development of the nervous system.
An innovative but controversial technique
This technique, which allows parents with a genetic disease to conceive healthy children, is not legally authorized in the United States, which is why parents traveled to Mexico to benefit from it. The intervention was carried out by an American team headed by Dr. John Zhang, of the New Hope Fertility Center in New York.
He transferred the genetic material containing the mother’s chromosomes to an egg from a donor whose genetic material had been removed.
Beyond the scientific feat, this technique is sure to worry people concerned with potential drifts linked to manipulations of genetic material.
Since 2015, Great Britain has legally authorized the right to fertilization from three parents.
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