Is cloning our pets a slippery slope to human cloning?

by Rochelle Foulk

Created on: November 08, 2009   Last Updated: November 10, 2009

Timmy is eleven years old and has come home from school to find his best friend Charles, a Labrador, dead from a heart defect. He is distraught and crying. Charles was his best friend and grew up with Timmy. His mother squats down next to her son as he cries. She puts a motherly arm around him and says, It's okay, honey, Charles can be brought back good as new.

Timmy is emotionally distraught, I don't want another dog, I want Charles! His mom holds him closer and says, Yes honey, we can do that. We can bring Charles back to life. Would you like that? Timmy now looks at his mother a hope coming into his dark brown eyes.

Really? Yes, oh yes mommy. Please! She smiles knowing that the loss of Charles has hit her son but that with new technology she can give him back his very best friend. They scoop Charles up and place him in the car. Together they drive to the local cloning hospital.

Wow! This will be great! Timmy exclaims. I didn't know that you could bring animals back to life. Can we bring back Grandpa too? Timmy asks hopefully. His mother looks over at her son, the classic June Cleaver smile.

We'll see, honey. Daddy is petitioning congress now to change the law. Then we can have our whole family back. Wouldn't that be great? she says. Timmy agrees and they take Charles into the cloning hospital to await the next available doctor.

If you read this thinking that it couldn't possibly happen. I would agree with you, to a point. Seriously though, it does happen and has happened. A couple in Florida had their dog cloned after he died. They paid $155,000 dollars for a Korean clinic to clone their dead dog. The couple was quoted as saying, "He was a human dog. We couldn't be without him."

Pets become like family for most of us, I am not without exception. My dog, Poet, was my best friend. I even called him my son. He lived with me for eleven years. As a chi hua hua he was larger than most other dogs of the same breed. Anyone who knew Poet would tell you he was a special dog. Almost human in his mannerisms and actions. In February of this year I had him put down for an extreme case of diabetes. His last week he became incontinent and wouldn't eat anything. I had no idea he had diabetes or that I had caused it in how I fed him. It was an emotional time for myself and my family. My partner was unable to accept the idea of letting him go. She paid for the blood work tests that led us to understanding why he was sick.

When the vet's office called to tell us that it was

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