The world's first cloned pigs were tonight hailed as a breakthrough in the effort to grow organs for transplant to humans in animals. But there was a warning that it will be years before any successful transplants could take place. The litter of cloned female piglets was born on Sunday week last in Virginia in the United States after scientists, working for the company which helped create Dolly the sheep, implanted cloned eggs in a sow.
The news of the cloning came as the British Prime Minister, Tony Blair, and US President, Bill Clinton, issued a joint statement calling for all raw data on the human gene project to be made freely available to scientists everywhere. The two leaders said that free access to the information could lead to cures for disease around the world and enhance the quality of life for all human kind.
