Senate passes bill to unravel Obama’s health care law

Senate passes bill to unravel Obama’s health care law

WASHINGTON (AP) — Openly welcoming a preordained veto, Republicans drove legislation to Senate passage Thursday aimed at crippling two of their favorite targets: President Barack Obama's health care law and Planned Parenthood.

With a House rubber stamp expected in days, the bill would be the first to reach Obama's desk demolishing his 2010 health care overhaul, one of his proudest domestic achievements, and halting federal payments to Planned Parenthood. Congress has voted dozens of times to repeal or weaken the health law and several times against Planned Parenthood's funding, but until now Democrats thwarted Republicans from shipping the legislation to the White House.

No designer babies, but scientists urge caution on gene editing
china

No designer babies, but scientists urge caution on gene editing

Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — A tool to edit human genes is nowhere near ready to use for pregnancy — but altering early embryos as part of careful laboratory research should be allowed as scientists and society continue to grapple with the ethical questions surrounding this revolutionary technology, organizers of an international summit concluded Thursday.

"It would be irresponsible" to edit human sperm, eggs or early embryos in a way that leads to pregnancy, said Nobel laureate David Baltimore of the California Institute of Technology, who chaired the summit.

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