Designer Babies
- Jan 9, 2006 -
Preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD)—or embryo screening is one of many relatively new tools being used by scientists and researches to re-engineer humanity. Like many biomedical technologies, PGD sounds, at first, like a wonderful tool. Take, for example, the case of Gweneth and Jeff Berkowitz. They lost a five-week-old child to myotonic dystrophy, a disease inherited from the mother who was unaware that she carried the gene for the disorder. The couple plans to have another child only after several embryos developed from their eggs and sperm are subjected to investigation through genetic screening. Those not found to be subject to some abnormality will be implanted in Gweneth.
But PGD has its detractors. Leon Kass, University of Chicago bioethicist says, “As parents assume responsibility for their child’s genotype, all kinds of notions of guilt and responsibility in households are going to change. You will no longer be able to say to your kid with a big nose, or who can’t dance, or is irascible, ‘Well, it’s just chance.’” And for now, there are no outside controls determining whether, when or how to use PGD technology. At present, scientists are just beginning to identify the genes that affect such traits as skin color, height, intelligence, temperament, etc. But, like many things once thought impossible, it is only a matter of time until the full range of genes controlling human traits are identified. And once that happens, the door will be open to parents (or someone else) to determine exactly what their child will be like. God will be left out of the equation and we will likely be thrown back to the early 20th century eugenics movement and its later adoption by the Nazis.
Rick Weiss, “Building a New Child: Embryo Screening Creates a Tool Against Disease—and Ethical Questions,” http://www.washingtonpost.com , June 30, 2001 [Access fee required]
A British woman with a son who has a rare form of anemia has recently given birth to another child that was conceived for the purpose of alleviating the first child’s medical problem. The couple involved was not able to get a permit for the procedure in England so they came to the United States where the child was conceived using in vitro fertilization (IVF) at the Reproductive Genetic Institute in Chicago. The couple is hoping that the second child’s umbilical stem cells will cure his older brother.
Not everyone is happy with the idea. Josephine Quintaville of Comment on Reproductive Ethics (CORE) says, “We’re sliding down a slippery slope, and we’ll keep going faster down that route.” She adds that this procedure is a “form of enslavement for the child who’s created.” John Smeaton, national director for the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, raises questions about the embryos that did not match the first child’s tissue type. He says, “While our hearts go out to everybody involved…there are profound issues of concern here. Human beings who were not the perfect match were simply discarded, and a child has been created with the primary purpose of benefiting his elder brother.” He added that this violates the second child’s human dignity.
British ‘Designer Baby’ Re-Ignites Controversy, June 19, 2003 [Accessed August 25, 2005]
“According to the January 26 issue of Newsweek, technology is making it possible for couples to choose whether they have a boy or a girl. Hundreds of American couples have already tried what some are calling ‘family balancing,’ and hundreds more hope to try it soon. Reporter Claudia Kalb writes, ‘Despite considerable moral murkiness, Americans are talking to their doctors and visiting catchy websites [about gender selection].’ “‘Moral murkiness’ indeed. Currently, the most successful method of gender selection is preimplantation genetic diagnosis, or PGD. The technique was created to screen embryos for diseases. Now it’s being used to screen them for gender as well. Doctors create multiple embryos, select a few of the desired gender, and implant them. The rest are frozen, donated, or discarded.
“It’s easy to see why PGD is the most controversial method of gender selection. But it’s not just the method that is disturbing; it’s the whole idea. For example, a company called MicroSort screens sperm cells for X and Y chromosomes before the embryos are created. Some people think this does away with the ethical dilemma of disposing of unused embryos. But MicroSort reports that four of its clients had abortions after they found out that their child was the wrong gender after all. That’s what we should expect when we start paying to create children to our specifications.
“How have we come to the point of destroying an unborn child simply because he or she isn’t the right gender? Perhaps Newsweek puts it best: ‘Throughout history, humans have wished for a child of one sex or the other and have been willing to do just about anything to get it. Now that gender selection is scientifically feasible, interest . . . is exploding.’”
Charles Colson, Because We Can: Taking Too Much Control Over Children (Prison Fellowship Ministries), Breakpoint Commentary, February 2, 2004 [Accessed August 25, 2005]
Further Learning
Learn more about: Life