http://www.babycenter.com/0_choosing-your-babys-sex-what-the-scientists-say_2915.bc
As you all probably know by now, I am interested in working in the medical field. One of the components of medicine that really interests me is health care ethics. There are so many ethical dilemmas that occur everyday in the clinical setting.
An issue that is becoming more of a hot topic in health care ethics is gene selection. Modern science has now made it possible for parents to get their fetus' gene pool scanned for "red-flag" genes. There are a lot of issues with this ability...
I think that when this ability was first discovered, the idea was to find genes linked with terminal or life-altering illnesses and "fix" or remove the gene. However, the ability to "fix" or remove these genes has not yet been discovered. So, if an unfavorable gene is found in a fetus, the parents either accept this gene and move on, or they abort the fetus.
As you might have guessed, there is a TON of ethical issues that goes along with these processes. 1) What types of genes are unfavorable? For example, if a person finds out that their child will have Down Syndrome and the scientific community is telling the parents that this is unfavorable and that they should abort the fetus, what does this say about the value of people with Down Syndrome? As a society we are saying that people with Down Syndrome are not valuable to us, so in turn, people who are already living with this disorder shouldn't have been born in the first place.
2) Gene selection is becoming a trend, and guess which gender is most often selected. You guessed it! Male. This is obviously a huge issue! It again shows how women are valued in society. There isn't a problem with being a woman...but...I want a boy please!
3) Availability of this resource. IVF (in-vitro fertilization) alone costs anywhere between 10 and 30 thousand dollars PER TRY! Imagine how much gene screenings must cost. This means that the only people being able to scan for unfavorable genes would be the wealthy, resulting in an even larger class division.
So basically, with the ability of gene selection, we will have a predominately male, healthy, elite upper class and a largely female, diseased, and inferior lower class. It kind of sounds like a Sci-fi movie, but when you really think about it, this is very much possibly our future if there are not restrictions on gene selection.
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ReplyDeleteThis is truly frightening. My sister has Turner Syndrome (a chromosomal disorder where she doesn't have both of her X chromosomes) and I think I remember her telling me that Turner's is one of the disorders being screened for. She also has Asperger's (a form of, or similar to Autism) so although she didn't show a lot of emotion in her reaction to the situation, it was obvious that this shook her...that she was obviously very upset. But I can't imagine how she really feels about her self-worth with this deep down. Being reminded each day that you are different, and now it turns out you are so different and "wrong" that yeah, you don't even belong here in the first place. Holy shit, I take my able-bodiedness for granted so much.
ReplyDeleteThis sounds like a scary horror film! I think I read a book like this once where gene selection was so advanced that everyone was born "perfect" (whatever that means). In the end people were actually just being controlled by the "superior" race, but of course the good guys win. That was a fantasy book though, and not real life. I remeber watching a documentary about abortions in India. For many families they want ultra-sounds to see the sex of the baby. For many poverty stricken people a female fetus is aborted because women are seen as a burden. When thinking about what genes are unfavorable I think about to the Ancient Spartans. Their idea of 'weeding out' the sick babies was to leave the new borns alone on a mountain, and see if they survived overnight. It seems as if that is what we could resort to again if the gene technology becomes more advanced. Parents could completely change the chemical make-up of their children! Yet, that chemical make-up is what makes all of us so unique. My little sis has cystic fibrosis, and so are her genes unfavorable? I would assume to many that they would be because of all her health complications, but that give NO ONE the right to change her in any way. There are already so many problems in the scientific/psychological fields with labeling people based on their disorders. Red-flagging genes is another way to subordinate someone, and create a new 'other' status.
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