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On March 3 the cover story of the New York Daily News trumpeted a simple imperative to “Design Your Baby.” The screaming headline related to a service that would try to allow parents to choose their baby’s hair, eye and skin color. A day later the Fertility Institutes reconsidered. The organization made an “internal, self regulatory decision” to scrap the project because of “public perception” and the “apparent negative societal impacts involved,” it noted in a statement.
The change of heart will do nothing to stymie the dawning era of what the article called “Build-A-Bear” babies. The use (and abuse) of advanced fertility technology that evokes fears of Gattaca, Brave New World and, of course, the Nazis’ quest for a blonde, blue-eyed race of Aryans continues apace. A recent survey found that about 10 percent of a group who went for genetic counseling in New York City expressed interest in screening for tall stature and that some 13 percent said they would be willing to test for superior intelligence. The Fertility Institutes is still building the foundation for a nascent dial-a-trait catalogue: it routinely accepts clients who wish to select the sex of their child.
The decision to scrap the designer baby service came just a few weeks after Nadya Suleman, a single, unemployed California mother living on food stamps, gained notoriety after giving birth to octuplets through in vitro fertilization. The Suleman brouhaha showed that even routine uses of reproductive technologies can be fraught with issues that bear on ethics and patient safety.
The preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) technique used by the Fertility Institutes to test embryos before implantation in the womb has enabled thousands of parents to avoid passing on serious genetic diseases to their offspring. Yet fertility specialists are doing more than tiptoeing into a new era in which medical necessity is not the only impetus for seeking help. In the U.S., no binding rules deter a private clinic from offering a menu of traits or from implanting a woman with a collection of embryos. Physicians who may receive more than $10,000 for a procedure serve as the sole arbiters of a series of thorny ethical, safety and social welfare questions. The 33-year-old Suleman already had six children, and her physician implanted her with six embryos, two of which split into twins. American Society for Reproductive Medicine (ASRM) voluntary guidelines suggest that, under normal circumstances, no more than two embryos be transferred to a woman younger than 35 because of the risk of complications.
Of course, any office consultation with a fertility doctor will likely neglect the nuances of more encompassing ethical dilemmas. Should parents be allowed to pick embryos for specific tissue types so that their new baby can serve as a donor for an ailing sibling? For that matter, should a deaf parent who embraces his or her condition be permitted to select an embryo apt to produce a child unable to hear? Finally, will selection of traits perceived to be desirable end up diminishing variability within the gene pool, the raw material of natural selection?
In the wake of the octuplets’ birth, some legislators made hasty bids to enact regulation at the state level—and one bill was drafted with the help of antiabortion advocates. The intricacies of regulating fertility technology requires more careful consideration that can only come with a measure of federal guidance. As part of the push toward health care reform, the Obama administration should carefully inspect the British model.
Since 1991 the U.K.’s Human Fertilization and Embryology Authority (HFEA) has made rules for in vitro fertilization and any type of embryo manipulation. The HFEA licenses clinics and regulates research: it limits the number of embryos implanted and prohibits sex selection for nonmedical reasons, but it is not always overly restrictive. It did not object to using PGD to pick an embryo that led to the birth of a girl in January who lacked the genes that would have predisposed her to breast cancer later in life.
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Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisCurrent day society doesnt much care for inconvenient life. Thats seems apparent whether its the life of the planet, the elderly, the prisoner, the poor in Africa or most certainly the embryo in the womb. I believe that Nadya Suleman made a life-decision based on love and courage. Her error was not her decision to have her babies, but rather it was her original decision to trust a science-oriented physician. Todays scientist seems to me to care too much for profit, prestige and power (3P), and will not yield to any voluntary guideline. Hence the race to be first with designer babies and societys harsh judgment of a woman who choose life. Good luck with getting any constraints agreed on or passed into law. The science lobby will never yield their 3Ps. Matt Peller
I agree, Matt. I think science should not attempt to save anyones lives. Survival of the fittest worked for millions of years, and it will continue to keep our population at a natural, sustainable level. You got crappy genes? Tough cookies, your turn to die. These weak, compassionate "everybody gets to reproduce" medical "scientists" are turning the gene pool into a cesspool. I wear glasses. WTF. My ancestors should have been killed by predators they didn't see coming. But noooo, now half of us have miserable eyesight. Best to nip this in the bud and just let the weak die, instead of fixing things.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt'll be interesting to see if the parents who choose their babies sex stick with their kid when that kid grows up to have serious sexual identity crises. Talk about feeling like a woman trapped in a mans body...
"The preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) technique used by the Fertility Institutes to test embryos before implantation in the womb has enabled thousands of parents to avoid passing on serious genetic diseases to their offspring."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis statement is technically incorrect. PGD allows parents to create a large number of offspring, passing any serious genetic diseases on to a portion of them, then to kill (discard, euphemistically) those they consider flawed. PGD is not preventative, as it does not prevent the creation of embryos with a genetic disorder. Instead, it is selective, choosing only the embryos the parents like best and destroying the rest.
"[S]ome legislators made hasty bids to enact regulation at the state leveland one bill was drafted with the help of antiabortion advocates. "
Why note that "antiabortion advocates" helped draft the legislation if not to express scorn towards them? This statement implies that having "antiabortion advocates" (instead of "reproductive technology advocates"?) advise legislators on crafting regulatory laws is a horrible sin made possible by a hysterical overreaction. I would note that "antiabortion advocates" have generally considered the ethics of beginning-of-life issues more carefully and thoroughly than most "reproductive technology advocates," whose concern is typically more practical than philosophical.
I strongly feel that if we start to tamper with human genes we might end up with geometric explosion of new human disease, thereby endangering the very existents our species. In my opinion, our evolution is relatively fast and is accellerating. Are we moving too hasty that we are sealing our doom? Just because anyone knows how to tweak human genes, we are qualified to see the future. Don't play like an idiotic god!!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisVery interesting that in a discussion of the moral issues surrounding these practices, the entire article focused on the possible negative impacts surrounding the embryos selected for implantation. The far graver concern went completely unmentioned: what inevitably is done to the living human embryos that go unselected. Governmental regulation must at the minimum protect the inalienable rights of all citizens of that government--especially of those without a voice.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe reason anti-abortionists are being scorned likely has to do with the fact that as a group they are biased with extreme prejudice, usually for religious reasons. As such they are an unbalancing factor in any decision making process of this magnitude. The true ethics are not being examined.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisDon't get me wrong. I think the idea of manipulating one's offspring is both highly presumptuous and dangerous. This is too complicated a phenomenon to tamper with at any level beyond simple health-preservation. Not only that, but the idea that certain traits can now be consciously selected by parents is frankly sickening. We're taking fashion way over the line here.
If we have the ability to control genes, then we should. With that kind of sophisticated technology, the world could potentially stamp out many diseases from genetic blood lines. Imagine the decrease in medical costs down the road, quite the investment. Why would we not want to enter the realm of preventative medicine? We should not leave such decisions to the hasty and superstitious.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisTweaking about genes is not having the ability to control the genes. It may result to immediate goal, but it will never give the whole future effect. There are so many factors that could change the human genes farther, once someone tampered it. That is why the practice should very tightly limited. I am afraid the money and ego will dangerously and recklessly proliferate the process. Do not wait until the time we cannot turn back the clock.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Misuse" is a loaded term for which the article offers no support. Humans have been genetically improving other species for millennia with no ill effects, and indeed, from the perspective of human welfare, many beneficial ones . It is nothing more than unfounded human exceptionalism that makes genetic enhancement appear unethical when applied to homo sapiens. I expect this kind of knee-jerk regressivism from the scientifically illiterate, and certainly from the religious masses, but SciAm should know better-- or should at least be willing to give the prospect of human genetic enhancement a fair and neutral evaluation.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGosh!I can't believe it ! Are the scientists so free?!This tech do help produce a few more normal people,but the baby born this way will probably feel ashamed and be criticized !!!have you considered the sea of possible issues? are these pro. just showing off?!!!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn response to [hotblack at 01:33 PM on 05/04/09], I fully agree. Nature was doing fine itself. Plus the more we mess around with nature selection, the more ethical issue arise.
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