Pet cloning continues to gain in popularity

We already know we love our dogs. And when they get sick or as they get older, we realize that we don’t have long with our furry family members. In some cases, that seems to be where the idea of cloning your pet comes into the picture.

While many individuals might consider adopting a new pet, for others it seems that cloning has become the go-to option to keep those beloved pets in our lives longer.

And over the last few years, the idea of pet cloning has continued to increase in popularity, even with the rather high costs associated with the process. In fact, according to a report from BBC News, “The cloning of pets is controversial, but growing in popularity despite its continuing high cost.”

In the United States, there is only one firm that offers the commercial cloning of dogs and cats. Known as Viagen, this Texas-based company has said that since it opened it has cloned hundreds of pets.

Cloning pets is gaining in popularity even with the high price tag associated with the process

So how much does it cost to clone a pet? When it comes to Viagen,

"The firm charges $50,000 (£38,000) to clone a dog, $30,000 for a cat, and $85,000 for a horse. That cost is obviously out of the range of most of us, but a number of famous people have revealed in recent years that they have had their dogs cloned, or were planning to do so."

Among the celebrities we know have cloned their own pets, there is Barbara Streisand, who revealed she had her beloved dog Samantha cloned. And yes, Viagen did the procedure, producing two puppies. It was a topic of conversation for quite a while when that news came out in 2018. And it is a topic that comes periodically when we talk about the singer and her pups.

Viagen’s president, Blake Russell, shared that, “A cloned pet is, simply put, an identical genetic twin, separated by years, decades, perhaps centuries.”

And while we can argue for or against the idea of cloning a beloved pet, we also understand it completely. We love our pets. We want them to live as long as we do. But we also know that won’t happen. Perhaps cloning can change that, but for many of us, the cost of the procedure means we will likely never have the opportunity to try it, even if we wanted to.

What do you think of the idea of cloning a pet? Would you do this? Do you think it is worst the cost?