Three-parent baby soon a reality?

Originally uploaded March 13, 2014

U.S. health officials are debating to approve trials for a novel in vitro fertilization technique which uses DNA from three people to eliminate debilitating disease.

Defective mitochondrial DNA from the mother's egg can lead to muscle weakness, and even heart and respiratory failures in the offspring.

The Food and Drug Administration conducted a review on this procedure which is expected to circumvent life-threatening mitochondrial diseases by replacing the mother's defective mitochondrial DNA with a 'second' mother's.

Critics of this technique argue that this puts us on a slippery slope towards making 'designer babies.'

"Where we get into the sticky part is, what if you get past transplanting batteries and start to say, 'While we're at it, why don't we make you taller, stronger, faster or smarter?'" Art Caplan, the director of medical ethics at New York University's Langone Medical Center, said in a CNN report.

Britain became the first country to allow this procedure in June. It is estimated that one in 6,500 babies in the UK is born with mitochondrial disorder each year.