Clinton and Blair hail gene 'triumph'

Bill Clinton today congratulated scientists on a "stunning and humbling achievement" in a joint announcement with Tony Blair called to mark the decoding of the human genome.

Speaking from the White House, Mr Clinton said: "Our children's children will only know cancer as a constellation of stars" and hailed the completion of the project after a 10-year race that cost billions.

"Today we are learning the language in which God created life," Mr Clinton said. "We are gaining ever more awe for the complexity, the beauty, the wonder of God's most divine and sacred gift."

Mr Blair, who joined the president via a satellite broadcast from Downing Street, added that it was "the first great technological triumph of the 21st century". "Every so often in the history of human endeavour there comes a breakthrough that takes mankind across the frontier and into a new era."

Mr Clinton joked that the life expectancy of the prime minister's baby son, Leo, had just risen by 25 years.

In the Commons, trade and industry minister Patricia Hewitt told MPs that Mr Blair and Mr Clinton believed that the "common property of the human genome should be used freely for the common good of the human race." Many fear that the work pioneered by US bio-technology firm Celera will allow pharmaceutical corporations to patent genes and genetic cures for diseases such as cancer.

Leading British scientists were however unanimous that mapping the human genome was one of the most significant scientific achievements of all time. Martin Bobrow, professor of medical genetics at Addenbrooke's Hospital, Cambridge, and a member of the government's Human Genetics Commission praised the research but warned that the work needed to maintain public confidence.

"It is a hugely significant milestone and there are many treasures there for health-related research. It is rather like reaching the top of a mountain pass and seeing in front of you a fertile plain, rich with new ideas, new methods, new techniques and new concepts for understanding the complexity of human biology in health and disease," he said.

Stephen Cox, executive secretary of the Royal Society, said: "What we have now is analogous to an alphabet - a prerequisite for a work of literature, but not yet the literature itself. The next step, no less challenging, is to learn how the letters can make words and the words can convey meaning."

Sceptics warned that the genetic breakthrough could usher in a sinister era of perfect people and death to the disabled. "The further science goes, the further the worst case scenario goes," said Steve Jenkins, a spokesman for the Church of England.