Comments and Questions from Our Inbox
D. Joy Riley, M.D., M.A.
Readers are always welcome to send in questions regarding bioethics issues. This past month, a wide range of thoughtful questions and comments have arrived in our inbox. A few representative ones have been chosen for this newsletter (with no identifiers included, of course).
Read on . . . and remember that you can always contact us here.
1) What exactly are three-parent embryos?Mitochondria are the power packs in our human cells, and reside in the cytoplasm — not in the nucleus. Mitochondrial disease varies widely in its expression, and has a prevalence rate of about 1 in 10,000 (Ricki ...read more
Response to NYT Magazine Journalist Kim Tingley
Sowing the Seeds, commissioned work by Carol Harkness for The Tennessee Center for Bioethics & Culture. View the full-size image here.
D. Joy Riley, M.D., M.A.
In February, The Tennessee Center for Bioethics & Culture made a public comment at an FDA committee hearing. The New York Times Magazine on 27 June published an account of that meeting about three-parent embryos. The author of the article conflates normal human sexual reproduction (i.e., having babies with a chosen partner) with genetic modification. She opines:
What often gets lost in the loaded language of the debate over three-parent babies is the fact that ordinary human reproduction ...read more
Art and Bioethics
Drawing by Eric Muller, Allentown, Pennsylvania, 2005.
The arts can inform us in ways words do not. Below is a brief overview of how The Tennessee Center for Bioethics & Culture has recently employed artwork to help people consider important questions about what it means to be human.
What the Eyes See, the Mind Knows40+ people attended our two sessions at the Center for Bioethics & Human Dignity Bioethics in Transition Conference, 19-21 June. Original art by multi-media artist Carol Harkness was featured, along with photos and graphics from other sources. Perhaps the most provocative conversation-starter was the 3-D “live ear” of Vincent van Gogh displayed currently ...read more
Selling the Fantasy of Fertility — NYT Opinion
“Selling the Fantasy of Fertility”
By Miriam Zoll and Pamela Tsigdinos
11 September 2013
Justices, 9-0, Bar Patenting Human Genes — NYT
By Adam Liptak — read the story here
Published 13 June 2013
Myriad Genetics CEO Claims He Owns Your Genes — Forbes
Steven Salzberg, Contributor
Published 13 April 2013
Article here.
Philadelphia Abortion Clinic Horror: Column — USAtoday.com
By Kirsten Powers
Originally published 11 April 2013
We’ve forgotten what belongs on Page One.
Documentary — When Assisted Death is Legal: Episode II
BBC World Service: first broadcast 20 February 2013
Liz Carr visits The Netherlands, and the American states of Washington and Oregon in the second episode of the two-part radio documentary on euthanasia and assisted suicide.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p014q86x
Perils of Newborn Screening — Scientific American
Doctors may be testing infants for too many diseases.
By Ariel Bleicher
2 July 2012
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=perils-of-newborn-screening
