Human Cloning

            
             Human cloning, while officially banned in America and most western nations, is probably one of the most important scientific achievements coming in the near future. Banning human cloning in America is a terrible blow to the science community; America can only fall behind as the science powerhouse.
             There are two types of cloning, therapeutic cloning and reproductive cloning. Therapeutic cloning could be used to create human organs exactly matching the one an individual might need. By having exact copies of an organ the body would not reject the organ. Having the abundance of cloned organs would eliminate the need for artificial organ creation.
             Reproductive cloning is by far the more controversial of the two methods of cloning. Reproductive cloning could be used to produce biologically related children to couples unable to have children. Reproductive cloning could also be used to reproduce a child lost at an early age. Even though the child would be an exact duplicate genetically, the child would have a different personality.
             Discussion.
             Therapeutic cloning is seen to have particular benefits in the field of organ and tissue transplantation. Many human diseases can now in theory be treated by organ transplantation. However, a common reason for failure when organs are transplanted is rejection, where the body sees the donor organ as foreign and begins to fight it. Therapeutic cloning could overcome this by "providing a potential source of organs or tissue that would not be rejected" as foreign because they would be genetically identical to the transplant recipient (Brown 251). It would also overcome the possibility of introducing new diseases into humans through using transgenic animals as donors. .
             Two common suggested uses of this multiple production of cells are to provide donor brain tissue for those with Alzheimer's disease, and to provide skin grafts for those who have suffered from severe burns or injury.