Editing Our Future
The recent (March 6-8, 2023) meeting of the Third International Summit on Human Genome Editing in London has brought ethical concerns about heritable human genome editing to the forefront once again. Recall that the previous meeting five years ago exploded into international furor over revelations from He Jiankui, the Chinese scientist who edited the genomes of three embryos and brought them to term. He was jailed for his actions in China and was only recently released. Apparently, he is unrepentant and still harboring visions of reactivating his genome editing pursuits. Not surprisingly, ...read more
What Does It Take to Alter Our Next Generation?
D. Joy Riley, M.D., M.A. Executive Director
I have been thinking about how one generation proactively alters the succeeding one. As I contemplated this conundrum, I found myself writing a story instead of a list. That story was published as a SALVO blog piece, and the link is below. The “angsty” pirate lives in a dystopia created by childhood desire, indulgent parents, a cooperative, complicit medical-industrial complex, and a legal climate in which desire is codified into law. What could possibly go wrong with that?
Click here to read the story. Then, send any comments to us through the Contact Us feature here ...read more
Statement on the Clinical Use of Human Germline Genome Editing
Given that According to the canons of research on children, experiments are only ethically justified when there are clear benefits to that individual child and proportional burdens to that child. Risks and burdens beyond truly “minimal” to individual children are not justified to benefit other children. To do so is to treat one child as a means to another child’s ends (i.e., to instrumentalize that child).
Whereas Human germline genome editing is experimentation on embryonic humans who cannot give consent, ...read more
Life Without Us?
By Jane Patton, Guest Columnist
It is not new that some people say that they do not want to bring children into the world. And, as far as the do’s and don’ts of being environmentally responsible, the carbon footprint of a single human being tops the list of avoidable behaviors. One presidential candidate even advocates abortion as a way to combat climate change. So, it may be okay to have one or two children. Any more than that and parents might be called selfish.
But, a growing movement is taking the idea of limiting births to the next level—preventing all births. Who ...read more
Selling the Fantasy of Fertility — NYT Opinion
“Selling the Fantasy of Fertility”
By Miriam Zoll and Pamela Tsigdinos
11 September 2013
Philadelphia Abortion Clinic Horror: Column — USAtoday.com
By Kirsten Powers
Originally published 11 April 2013
We’ve forgotten what belongs on Page One.
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
The Ovolution of the Three-Parent Embryo
Donor treatments for mitochondrial DNA disorders are ethical — Nuffield Council on Bioethics (Press Release)
http://www.phgfoundation.org/news/11991/
Philosophies, as well as Actions, Have Consequences*
D. Joy Riley, M.D., M.A.
Executive Director
29 February 2012
It was Horace Mann who said, “Habit is a cable; we weave a thread of it every day, and at last we cannot break it.” If that habit is of thought, it becomes a philosophy. Whether that habit is of thought or action, there are attendant consequences. Let’s consider children in this light.
Whether one thinks that babies are commodities, “not yet persons,” or a heritage, those philosophies have consequences. Recently, Theresa Erickson came face-to-face with the consequences of viewing babies as commodities (wire tap recordings). Ms. Erickson, the author of ...read more
