British embryo laws face overhaul

LONDON -- Researchers will be allowed to create test-tube embryos that are part human, part animal under a proposal to be announced by government health officials this week.

A child's need for a father no longer will be a consideration when a woman seeks fertility treatment, but the creation of a human embryo from two women, which would make men obsolete in reproduction, would be forbidden.

These and other changes in Britain's laws on embryos are to be introduced this week in a major overhaul for a nation that already has some of the world's most liberal laws on stem-cell research.

"The overarching aim is to pursue the common good through a system broadly acceptable to society," British Health Minister Caroline Flint said in the forward to a report outlining the policy, which was made available to the Sunday Telegraph.