

In New Way to Edit DNA, Hope for Treating Disease - tokenadult
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/29/health/research/29zinc.html

======
tokenadult
"Zinc fingers may also make technically possible a morally fraught procedure
that has been merely a theoretical possibility--the alteration of the human
germ line, meaning the egg or sperm cells. Genetic changes made in current
gene therapy are to body cells, and they would die with the individual. But
changes made to the germ line would be inherited. Many ethicists and others
say this is a bridge that should not be crossed, since altering the germ line,
even if justifiable for medical reasons, would lower the barrier to other
kinds of change."

That would be a very interesting development in gene therapy if it occurred.
The article goes on to mention pros and cons of gene therapy on germ line
cells, as contrasted with gene therapy on somatic cells, and mentions a likely
candidate disease for a first trial of germ line therapy in human beings.

