Catholic leader attacks "monstrous" embryo research

By Peter Griffiths

LONDON (Reuters) - Research using hybrid human-animal embryos for experiments is "monstrous" and should be banned, the leader of the Roman Catholic Church in Scotland said on Friday.

Cardinal Keith O'Brien said a proposed new law -- the Human Fertilization and Embryology Bill -- should outlaw the practice.

The House of Lords rejected attempts earlier this year to include a ban on hybrid research in the draft legislation.

"This Bill represents a monstrous attack on human rights, human dignity and human life," O'Brien will say in his Easter Sunday sermon, according to extracts published in Friday's Daily Record newspaper. "In some other European countries, one could be jailed for doing what we intend to make legal."

In an interview with BBC radio on Friday, he added: "This is Frankenstein science and it must be stopped."

Scientists said the cardinal did not understand the issue properly and accused him of "scaremongering".

Supporters of hybrid research say it will give scientists the large number of embryos they need to make stem cells to help find cures for a range of diseases.

Researchers create inter-species hybrids by injecting human DNA into a hollowed-out animal egg cell. The resulting embryo is 99.9 percent human and 0.1 percent animal.