GMO to a delivery room near you...

nooshinjohn

Interesting read coming out of Britain...

http://www.nbcnews.com/health/britain-plans-worlds-first-go-ahead-3-parent-ivf-babies-6C10476066

Britain is planning to become the first country in the world to offer controversial "three-parent" fertility treatments to families who want to avoid passing on incurable diseases to their children.


The methods, currently only at the research stage in laboratories in Britain and the United States, would for the first time involve implanting genetically modified embryos into women, and raise serious ethical questions.

The techniques involve intervening in the fertilization process to remove faulty mitochondrial DNA, which can cause inherited conditions such as fatal heart problems, liver failure, brain disorders, blindness and muscular dystrophy.

They are designed to help families with mitochondrial diseases - incurable conditions passed down the maternal line that affect around one in 6,500 children worldwide. Mitochondria act as tiny energy-generating batteries inside cells,

The controversial potential treatment is known as three-parent in vitro fertilization (IVF) because the offspring would have genes from a mother, a father and from a female donor.

After a national public consultation showed Britons broadly favor the idea, the government's chief physician said on Friday it should be allowed to go ahead under strict regulation.

"Scientists have developed ground-breaking new procedures which could stop these diseases being passed on, bringing hope to many families seeking to prevent their children inheriting them," Sally Davies, chief medical officer, told reporters.

"It's only right that we look to introduce this life-saving treatment as soon as we can."

Davies said the government's health department is drafting regulations to cover the new treatments, and plans to publish them later this year. The move would make Britain the first country in the world to give patients to option of using so-called mitochondrial DNA transfer to avoid passing the diseases on to their children.

DNA SWAP

Scientists are researching several three-parent IVF techniques.

One being developed at Britain's Newcastle University, known as pronuclear transfer, swaps DNA between two fertilized human eggs. Another, called maternal spindle transfer, swaps material between the mother's egg and a donor egg before fertilization.

A British medical ethics panel which reviewed the potential treatments for mitochondrial diseases decided last year they were ethical and should go ahead as long as research shows they are likely to be safe and effective.

Because Britain is in the vanguard of this research, ethical concerns, political decisions and scientific advances here are closely watched around the world - particularly in the United States where scientists are also working on DNA swap techniques.

Some pro-life campaigners have criticized the scientific research, saying that creating embryonic children in a lab abuses them by subjecting them to unnatural processes.

Critics also worry that modifying embryos to avoid disease could be the first step towards the creation of "designer babies", whose genetic makeup could be modified as embryos to ensure certain traits such as height or hair color.

Asked whether she was "comfortable" with taking such a major step along the way to allowing human genetic modification, Davies said she had debated and considered the ethical implications with many experts over many years and had come to the conclusion the techniques should be allowed.

Any final decision on putting the regulations in place to allow the new treatments to be offered will be subject to a vote in parliament, but Davies said she hoped the first patients may be able to get the new treatments within the next two years.





Women's Health
Health care
Women's health

And in this country all we worry about is GMO corn. But I suppose if they can use these techniques to cure their epidemic of dental problems, it may not be so bad.:cheesygrin:

I suspect however that such technology will be used for only good.:rolleyes::rolleyes::eek: Why this is allowed anywhere on the face of this earth is way beyond my comprehension, first we kill God, then aspire to become God, and when we think we are better than the Old Man, it never ends well. Also notice the heading of the story is under "women's health"... guess with these techniques, men are no longer required. This story should be under science and technology, as there is nothing healthy about where this all leads.

nooshinjohn

deleted.. double post

F1nut

That doesn't sound like a good idea to me.

headrott

Yeah, I'm sure there will be absolutely no side effects from this mitochondrial DNA manipulation and 3 genetic variables instead of two.

Also, I find it funny that we are working on how to get rid of genetic defects in a newly fertilized egg (embryo) and yet we are not working on actually allowing ALL ebryos to develop and be born without the possibility of being aborted.*

Ironic, isn't it? Logical? Hardly. Ethical? Hardly. Correct? Hardly.

*Yes, I realise I am being very extreme in my statements, but this is an extreme medical procedure that is being "developed".

I also wanted to point out that they say it's "likely to be safe and effective". I am wondering how many generations of children they have done this with? What if problems don't arise until the 5th generation of a 3 genetic variable child having children? How are these scientists sure it's "likely safe and effective"?

tonyb

I guess an old saying applies.....just because you CAN do something, doesn't mean you SHOULD.

EndersShadow

John, isnt that basically the beginning plot for Gattaca being played out on a National level?

Gattaca is a 1997 science fiction film written and directed by Andrew Niccol. It stars Ethan Hawke and Uma Thurman, with Jude Law, Loren Dean, Ernest Borgnine, Gore Vidal, and Alan Arkin appearing in supporting roles.

The film presents a biopunk vision of a future society driven by liberal eugenics where potential children are selected through preimplantation genetic diagnosis to ensure they possess the best hereditary traits of their parents. A genetic registry database uses biometrics to instantly identify and classify those so created as "valids" while those conceived by traditional means are derisively known as "in-valids". While genetic discrimination is forbidden by law, in practice it is easy to profile a person's genotype resulting in the valids qualifying for professional employment while the in-valids—considered more susceptible to disease, educational dysfunction and shorter lifespans—are relegated to menial jobs.

The movie draws on concerns over reproductive technologies which facilitate eugenics, and the possible consequences of such technological developments for society. It also explores the idea of destiny and the ways in which it can and does govern lives. Characters in Gattaca continually battle both with society and with themselves to find their place in the world and who they are destined to be according to their genes. Gattaca is the name of the space agency in the film. The name is based on the first letters of guanine, adenine, thymine, and cytosine, the four DNA nitrogenous bases. The film was a 1997 nominee for the Academy Award for Best Art Direction and the Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gattaca
Attachment not found.

Tornado Red

Wow, that's scary stuff. If they can weed out those diseases, etc, they could probably make everyone blue eyed, blond, perfect teeth....hmmmm, didn't someone try that about 70-80 years ago? I don't recall it working out so well.

maximillian

Science is cool, but this is one area where I think an alternative for parents (adoption) would be a better solution. There are so many kids neglected due to scumbag parents that I would rather see that problem solved than this one. Just this week I heard about a kid in foster care because his mother couldn't care for him and her newborn daughter. The mother decided that she could only care for 1 child and chose the baby over the 5 year old. How could someone make such a decision is beyond me. The 5 year old now up for adoption.

obieone

How ironic! The left refers to the right as ****'s....:rolleyes:

zingo

I am all for new science, but I also agree and feel for humanitarian reasons, becoming a parent for the parentless is a better option.

Syndil

I think this is a necessary step. Modern medicine has essentially short-circuited evolution in humans. We have treatments and cures for everything now, so the natural law of "only the strong survive" no longer applies. If we are to continue to evolve, we must take control of that evolution ourselves.

In fact, it may not even be a matter of just evolution, but of survival of the entire species. With all of these faulty genes no longer being weeded out of the gene pool (as they would in nature), it weakens the species as a whole.

If a person has a tumor, we remove it, and no one complains about the doctor trying to "play God" by doing so. Arguably, God put the tumor there, so why is that? I see no ethical problems between that and preventing the tumor from growing in the first place.

BlueFox

Genetic engineering, like most technology, is a two edged sword that can be good an bad. Personally, I am all for it, but with safeguards. However, it won't be long before any lab in the world will be able to whip up any organism they want. Kind of like that guy's apartment in Blade Runner where he had it full of 'toys' he created. Anyway, from a purely selfish perspective I want them go hurry up and cure old age, and restore my body to my 20s. I can handle that for a few thousand years.

EndersShadow

Personally messing with DNA isn't our job. We barely understand the human genome, so why mess with it?

If this would actually happen I forsee a future where you go and pickout the traits from a menu for a child and then you just contribute your fluids and they make it so.

The wonder of conception and birth are something that no one should mess with.

I believe the phrase is "variety is the spice of life". Do you really want to be able to cookie cutter your kid?

P.S. this is coming from someone with a chronic medical condition as well that affects my life daily. I wouldn't want to trade this condition for anything, it has helped shaped me as a person and without it who knows what type of personality I would have.

sucks2beme

You can't stop it, so why worry?
Only the rich can afford it, so if something goes wrong
they can afford to deal with it. 99.99% of us will be doing
it the old fashioned way.
One of my nieces provides genetic "counseling".
So it's not like people aren't already paying $$$ for
at least a basic version of this.

telemetry

Artificial Intelligence stands no chance against Natural Stupidity.

badchad

If people want to improve their lives and the lives of their children via modern biotechnology they should be allowed to do so in my humble opinion. Most people have only arbitrary reasons for opposing such research.

fossy

Dang , I have defects ? Well I do have fingers for toes but I can eat wif 4 hands !!!! another thing I guess they could fix is my unusual kindness to my damn bum arse family members ..... lets see ....... I like the alcoholism in our family so don't mess with that ...... we are kinda a ugly bunch , so fixin that would mess up the inbreedin ......... nope like that also ....:eek:

nooshinjohn

If people want to improve their lives and the lives of their children via modern biotechnology they should be allowed to do so in my humble opinion. Most people have only arbitrary reasons for opposing such research.

There are other ways of doing that without getting into mitochondrial DNA. We have, in the grand scheme of things, just enough intelligence to be incredibly stupid., and with that same intelligence comes the arrogance needed to be blind to our own stupidity. Let science figure out how to cure cancer, spinal cord injury, or blindness. Lets figure out how to grow new organs from stem cells or fix a broken healthcare system that would let a ten year old girl die because a pencil pushing nitwit says she is too young for a transplant.

Humanity did not grow and thrive for a million years inside a test tube and under controlled conditions. We won't survive that way either. Some day somewhere one of these scientists, accidentally or on purpose, will unleash something vile upon the world and things will not end well.

This may look to some like crazy talk, but it would be foolish to assume otherwise and give science the benefit of the doubt, given the history of mankind and our propensity to find new and even more creative ways of wiping ourselves out.

badchad

An alternative approach would be to impart appropriate safe guards, tread slowly, collect the appropriate data, and make an informed, rational, decision based on objective criteria.

You can fear for the end of the earth in a myriad of ways. At one point, we thought we'd sail off the end of the earth to our demise, but lo and behold, the earth is round. Progress cannot be made in the grip of paralyzing fear.

Syndil

nooshinjohn wrote: »

Humanity did not grow and thrive for a million years inside a test tube and under controlled conditions. We won't survive that way either.

Modern medicine is a relatively recent invention, and we do not yet know how great of an impact this will have on our gene pool. Manipulating our DNA may not only be desirable, but necessary in order to ensure the continuation of the human species. Modern conveniences come with a price, and the price of the convenience of medicine may be our largest yet. You cannot simply sidestep the most basic rule of nature (survival of the fittest) and expect zero consequences.

Some day somewhere one of these scientists, accidentally or on purpose, will unleash something vile upon the world and things will not end well.

Most of the posts against this development seem to have share the same sentiment, that we as a human race are inherently evil and/or too stupid to know what is right. This sentiment is one that seems to be cultivated by the mainstream media, but it is one I wholly reject.

nooshinjohn

badchad wrote: »

. Progress cannot be made in the grip of paralyzing fear.

Everybody speaks of "progress" in fanciful terms and then follow up with "don't be afraid"... I have yet to get an answer to the question "what are we "progressing" towards?" All I get are blanks stares. One would think that if we are going to progress, somebody should know what the goal of "progress" is.

I am all for well reasoned, sound and thoughtful progress, but playing with things that we barely understand and are hardly ready for the consequences of messing with doesn't seem very smart at all. There are trillions of variables at play here and we can't even predict with and degree of certainty what tomorrow will bring.

nooshinjohn

Syndil wrote: »

Modern medicine is a relatively recent invention, and we do not yet know how great of an impact this will have on our gene pool. Manipulating our DNA may not only be desirable, but necessary in order to ensure the continuation of the human species. Modern conveniences come with a price, and the price of the convenience of medicine may be our largest yet. You cannot simply sidestep the most basic rule of nature (survival of the fittest) and expect zero consequences..

The human race has survived and thrived without altering our genetic code since the first humans started drawing on cave walls. As I said in a previous post, cure cancer, aids, spinal injury and alzheimers, then we might be smart enough to move on to the next chapter of the science curriculum.

Syndil wrote: »

Most of the posts against this development seem to have share the same sentiment, that we as a human race are inherently evil and/or too stupid to know what is right. This sentiment is one that seems to be cultivated by the mainstream media, but it is one I wholly reject.

All it takes is one...
This dashingly good looking gentleman seems so suave and debonair, just the sort that could be trusted with poking into our genetic souls and making us better, doesn't he? Joseph Mengele was such a nice guy. Combine these minds with a rogue state and you have the beginnings of a global man-made disaster. Mankind as a whole, I do not fear, but if you look to all of human history, you will see that it is not the goodness of mankind that is the problem. The evil of just one is enough to bring nations to war. How do you propose we stop the lone nut with this kind of power?

badchad

nooshinjohn wrote: »

Everybody speaks of "progress" in fanciful terms and then follow up with "don't be afraid"... I have yet to get an answer to the question "what are we "progressing" towards?" All I get are blanks stares. One would think that if we are going to progress, somebody should know what the goal of "progress" is.

Increased quality of life. I think most would be of the opinion that life is better now versus 100 years ago. We could measure this in any number of ways: increased life expectancy, the eradication of smallpox, polio, and other diseases. Things we can objectively measure. In this case specifically, the article is implying a decrease in the incidence of incurable, inherited disease.

nooshinjohn wrote: »

I am all for well reasoned, sound and thoughtful progress, but playing with things that we barely understand and are hardly ready for the consequences of messing with doesn't seem very smart at all. There are trillions of variables at play here and we can't even predict with and degree of certainty what tomorrow will bring.

I don't think anyone would disagree with you on this. I just hadn't formed the opinion that these procedures weren't well-researched. I'd imagine (perhaps incorrectly), there are a host of data on the procedures in question.

jflail2

"Test tube babies" have actually been around for a while now (late 70's I think.) I'm sure at the time the idea was considered an abomination by many. We're obviously now talking about a whole different level of "messing with things", but I'm still for scientific progress. I'm supportive of stem cell research as well, but I'm very.....agnostic I suppose.

Bottom line, I suspect we shouldn't always know what the goal of progress is. The whole microwave oven concept was completely accidental. Inventors (except for maybe Tesla) 50 years ago couldn't have fathomed the technological progress we've made over the last 1/2 century or so. Why limit ourselves to only what we can conceive of now?

nooshinjohn

badchad wrote: »

Increased quality of life. I think most would be of the opinion that life is better now versus 100 years ago. We could measure this in any number of ways: increased life expectancy, the eradication of smallpox, polio, and other diseases. Things we can objectively measure. In this case specifically, the article is implying a decrease in the incidence of incurable, inherited disease.

Who defines what a disease is? Or a handicap? I know little people that do NOT want this. Same goes for Down's Syndrome.. what about hereditary traits such as skin or eye color. The guy's picture above actually tried doing those things... For that which is known on any subject, there are thousands of things we do not. The internal combustion engine is perhaps the single most complicated machine any of us use on a daily basis. I have had powertrain engineers tell me that there are thousands of things learned every year to make them better and still more after that. We just DON"T know.

I am not saying that we shouldn't know or strive to understand all we can, just that we need to proceed with extreme caution, and then after that we should still proceed with extreme caution. The book has yet to be written on this subject, so why are we already trying to read chapter 12?

SDA1C

nooshinjohn wrote: »

The human race has survived and thrived without altering our genetic code since the first humans started drawing on cave walls. As I said in a previous post, cure cancer, aids, spinal injury and alzheimers, then we might be smart enough to move on to the next chapter of the science curriculum.

John,

Do you not remember the movie 'I am Legend'?

nooshinjohn

SDA1C wrote: »

John,

Do you not remember the movie 'I am Legend'?

Saw it a few times... I view it as a cautionary tale, and with my mom having had cancer 5 times, the current one caused by the treatment to save her life 40 years ago, there is truth in the story. We need to be so perfectly clear in our use of these technologies lest the cure become the disease.

badchad

nooshinjohn wrote: »

Who defines what a disease is? Or a handicap? I know little people that do NOT want this. Same goes for Down's Syndrome.. what about hereditary traits such as skin or eye color. The guy's picture above actually tried doing those things... For that which is known on any subject, there are thousands of things we do not. The internal combustion engine is perhaps the single most complicated machine any of us use on a daily basis. I have had powertrain engineers tell me that there are thousands of things learned every year to make them better and still more after that. We just DON"T know.

I wouldn't equate things like eugenics, genocide, and/or selective breeding with technology, as they can easily occur independently of technology or modern advancements. People can simply elect NOT to have this procedure. If you truly want to raise a little person, or someone with Down's then so be it. These ethical considerations can occur independently of the technology.

And I guess you're right, perhaps I should consider that the complexity and advancement of the combustion engine. Maybe someday it'll become so advanced, as to be self-aware and take over the world. It could happen...

nooshinjohn wrote: »

I am not saying that we shouldn't know or strive to understand all we can, just that we need to proceed with extreme caution, and then after that we should still proceed with extreme caution. The book has yet to be written on this subject, so why are we already trying to read chapter 12?

Again, I agree. However, I don't assume this is a completely unresearched technology and it'll cause the demise of mankind. I would hope that Britain's health care review system has some grasp on the risk benefit ratio of this technology before allowing it to proceed. However, I will fully admit that I'm unfamiliar with that system.

Syndil

nooshinjohn wrote: »

The human race has survived and thrived without altering our genetic code since the first humans started drawing on cave walls. As I said in a previous post, cure cancer, aids, spinal injury and alzheimers, then we might be smart enough to move on to the next chapter of the science curriculum.

The human race benefited from natural selection until the advent of modern medicine, a relatively recent advance. Without natural selection to keep these diseases in check, cancer, alzheimers and other genetic disorders may reach epidemic status. If you want to cure genetic diseases, you need to weed them out of the genome, which is the goal of the procedure we are discussing. Everything else is a treatment--a band-aid for a problem that cannot be prevented by any other means.

Some day somewhere one of these scientists, accidentally or on purpose, will unleash something vile upon the world and things will not end well.

Methinks you've been watching too many movies.

Saw it a few times... I view it as a cautionary tale...

Uh, yeah.

nooshinjohn

Movies are for fun... history is where you find the real scary crap. Funny that you quote me on everything else in your replies, but when I actually produce historical precedent to support my healthy skepticism of the benevolent nature of science, you completely ignore it.

I do not fear new discovery, nor do I really fear GMO for the most part. I do not trust anyone, given history's lessons and repeated examples of what happens when one acquires far too much power, to use that power in a beneficial way. To me there is no more ABSOLUTE POWER than the power to manipulate and control the very structure of life itself.

Someday perhaps my genome or my (or your) child's genome will be determined as "undesirable" and they will be sterilized at birth and prevented from reproducing, or worse, forced termination of that pregnancy. It already happens in places like China... is that a road we want to go down?

BlueFox

nooshinjohn wrote: »

Movies are for fun... history is where you find the real scary crap. Funny that you quote me on everything else in your replies, but when I actually produce historical precedent to support my healthy skepticism of the benevolent nature of science, you completely ignore it.

I do not fear new discovery, nor do I really fear GMO for the most part. I do not trust anyone, given history's lessons and repeated examples of what happens when one acquires far too much power, to use that power in a beneficial way. To me there is no more ABSOLUTE POWER than the power to manipulate and control the very structure of life itself.

Someday perhaps my genome or my (or your) child's genome will be determined as "undesirable" and they will be sterilized at birth and prevented from reproducing, or worse, forced termination of that pregnancy. It already happens in places like China... is that a road we want to go down?

The problem here is you are taking one thing (genetic engineering to correct genetic diseases), and going off on a completely different tangent. Certainly there is the potential for abuse, but the potential for good is also there.

To me there is no more ABSOLUTE POWER than the power to manipulate and control the very structure of life itself.

That already exists in society in a number of forms; for example, guns.

Wouldn't it be nice if we could genetically engineer ourselves to instantly heal wounds, regrow organs, limbs, etc. This is the next step in evolution. Humans, not random genetic mutations, controlling our destiny. Scary? Yes. But exciting also. I have said for decades that I might be in the last generation that has to die from natural causes, although I hope the breakthroughs happen before I die.

Even more interesting in my mind are the social implications from people being able to live healthy, productive lives for who knows how long.