Designer babies

Sandeen B.
Harris Girls' Academy
England, United Kingdom

BIG QUESTION ABOUT DESIGNER BABIES IS . . . SHOULD DESIGNER BABIES BE MADE LEGAL IN THE UK ?

Some people worry about the ethical implications of IVF. They are concerned that couples may want 'designer babies' with 'desirable' qualities, so may only want certain fertilised eggs. For example, they may want a girl if they have lots of boys in the family, or they may wish to avoid producing a baby with an inherited defect.

How will the parents of the future make babies? Will they be happy leaving the health, character and looks of their child to chance - or will they opt for the perfect child designed in a lab? Is it ethical? Is it legal? Should there be a limit to this practise?

Arguments for creating designer babies

Some couples are not able to have children because their children will have a genetic disease and die before they are born or when they are very young. Techniques used to change the genetic make-up of the embryo allow these parents to have a child. If we want the best for our children why shouldn't we design our own babies? Using genetic techniques we can help prevent certain genetic diseases. This both saves the children from suffering and reduces the cost and emotional strain of looking after an ill child. Will this lead to happier children and parents?

Spare-part children? In a few cases where parents have had one child with a serious blood disease, they have used IVF to select embryos so that they can have a second child that can act as a future, tailor-made blood or bone marrow donor. In these cases, when the child is born, he or she will be healthy and can help their older brother or sister stay well.

Arguments against creating designer babies

But is this right? In these cases, parents and doctors are creating a child to act as an organ-donating factory. How will the child feel? The child may feel that they were only born to be a help to their older brother or sister. Children should be loved and cherished for themselves and not what they can do for others.

These genetic techniques are very expensive. Why should only rich people be able to eradicate genetic diseases? This could lead to imbalances between rich and poor people.

Will we breed a race of super-humans who look down on those without genetic enhancements? Even today people who are born with disabilities face intolerance. Will discrimination against people already born with disabilities increase?

We could get carried away 'correcting' perfectly healthy babies. Once we start to eliminate embryos because they have the gene for a disease, what is to stop us from picking babies for their physical or psychological traits?

At the moment we can screen human embryos to choose only those embryos without the 'bad' genes. But is it right to add new artificial genes, or take away other genes? These genetic changes will be permanent and be contained in every single cell of the baby.

Alterations made by genetic engineering would be passed on from one generation to the next. What right have parents to choose what genetic characteristics are best for their children, and their children's children. Will the children react against the genetic changes that their parents have chosen for them?

Who is responsible for genetic modification of a child? The parents? The doctors? Or the Government?

Is it right to experiment on babies?

Animal studies have shown that this type of genetic engineering is unpredictable. There is a huge risk that we may produce physical changes, or even change the child's personality. Mice whose genes had been changed to make them more muscular, unexpectedly became very timid compared to other non-genetically engineered mice!

However, some scientists think they will become more certain about how a gene will act if it is engineered into a person or an animal.

Will future humans have animal genes added to them to give them superhuman abilities? This really could happen. Human genes have been engineered into animals for years.

Can they cure disease?

A woman who was given permission to have embryo screening treatment in a bid to save her son is carrying the UK's first 'designer baby'.

Julie Fletcher and husband Joe, from Moira, County Down, won the go-ahead earlier this year to begin treatment.

Their two-year-old son Joshua has a potentially fatal blood disorder. Diamond Blackfan anaemia (DBA) can be treated by using stem cells from a sibling to stimulate his body to produce healthy red blood cells.

Political views

There are different political parties who are not in favor of designer babies because their supports feel we are tampering with human nature. in the senate at the moment, they are considering passing a ban on the creation of designer babies, this topic has created much argument between the political parties who are in favour and who are against the use of science to create these babies.

Religious views

The Roman Catholic Church and other organized religions have many problems when it comes to the topic of designer babies. Like the political parties, they too feel that science is playing with human nature. They also feel that we are also tampering with the way God made us. They feel that in making babies by design science has taken a step closer to 'playing God' themselves.

Should scientists tamper with the genes of unborn children to cure genetic disease?

Is it right?
Is it unnatural?

Should parents be allowed to custom build their children?

Will it lead to happier parents and children?

Will it lead to healthier people?

Will it lead to more beautiful people?

Will it lead to there being more differences between rich and poor people?

Actual process

The process to the creation of a designer baby is complex, and requires a lot of studying and what knowledge. We take certain genes and alter them for our and in doing so create the baby you want. if you want the kid with black hair, it will come out with black hair, we can also do things for any genetic mutations that might come out of the thing due to the genes, which before there was nothing we could do, but with this scientific advancement, now things can be done.

Conclusion

As I conclude my argument, I think that designer babies are a bad idea because, in a religious point of view your offspring will not be Gods own creation but designed to his or her parents. Although I believe if this new technology is legal it would cure diseases.

References

• "Bionet Online"
• "Wikipedia"
• "Action Bio Science"
• "Religious Views"
• "BBC News Article - Mother carrying 'designer baby'

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