, Columnist
Nature Hasn't Created a Perfect Species, and Neither Will We
The recent claim of tweaking a baby's DNA to make her immune to HIV is also a claim to have made her vulnerable to flu and other viruses. There's always a trade-off.
“Even cats have their flaws.”
Photographer: Chris J. Ratcliffe/Getty Images
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For such flawed creatures, human beings are surprisingly hard to improve, at least through our genes.
That’s one reason there’s so much outcry over the recent claim that researchers in China altered the genes of a pair of twins girls – endowing at least one with resistance to HIV. The genetic change, even if it worked as advertised, would not be a clear-cut improvement but a trade-off.