China's Second Woman Pregnant with Gene-Edited Baby

A second Chinese woman is carrying gene-edited baby and is being medically supervised by local authorities, according to a Chinese government investigation revealed on Monday. Investigators told the scientist was “pursuing personal fame” and used “self-raised funds” for the controversial experiment.
Researcher He Jiankui who claimed to have created the world’s first genetically-edited babies will face a Chinese police investigation, as authorities confirmed that a second woman fell pregnant during the experiment.
He shocked the scientific community last year after announcing he had successfully altered the genes of twin girls born in November to prevent them contracting HIV.
Speaking at the human genome summit in Hong Kong in November, He said he was “proud” of the experiment, given the stigma affecting Aids patients in the country and there had been “another potential pregnancy” involving a second couple.

The provincial government investigation found He had “forged ethical review papers” and “deliberately evaded supervision”. He had privately organised a project team that included foreign staff and used “technology of uncertain safety and effectiveness” for illegal human embryo gene-editing, it said.
Such gene-editing work is banned in most countries, including China. Xinhua report agency said
He will be “dealt with seriously according to the law”.
The public outcry over his experiment also drew attention to the growing HIV epidemic in China, which has seen a drastic surge in new cases in recent years.
The scientist was educated at Stanford University and recruited back to China as part of Beijing’s “Thousand Talents Plan” to reverse brain drain, according to a copy of his resume published on the website of the Southern University of Science and Technology (SUSTech) in Shenzhen.
SUSTech said in a statement on Monday it had terminated the researcher’s employment after earlier saying He’s work had “seriously violated academic ethics”.
Experts anxious about “meddling with the genome of an embryo could cause harm not only to the individual but also to future generations who inherit the same changes”, and say “there are too many scientific and technical uncertainties to permit clinical trials”.