Catholic Bioethicist Warns Against Gene-editing Experiments

National Catholic Register (EWTN Mews) ^ | June 28, 2020 | Kate Scanlon

[Marchmain]

Joseph Meaney, PH.D., speaking Friday in an interview on EWTN Pro-Life Weekly, said that the experiment gone wrong was predictable, because “science, as it emerges into new areas, makes a lot of mistakes.”

WASHINGTON — In the wake of a gene-editing experiment gone wrong, the president of the National Catholic Bioethics Center said that the Church must stand firm against the unborn being “sacrificed on the altar of scientific research.”

Medium’s science publication OneZero reported last week that scientists in the United Kingdom recently conducted an experiment where they deleted a gene from human embryos using the CRISPR technique.

They later realized the edited embryos also contained significant unintended edits that could lead to birth defects or other major medical issues later in life. The embryos were subsequently destroyed.

“There’s no sugarcoating this,” Fyodor Urnov, a professor of molecular and cell biology at the University of California, Berkeley, told OneZero. “This is a restraining order for all genome editors to stay the living daylights away from embryo editing.”

“It’s really terrible, what they’re talking about, because gene editing for embryos, because it’s germline changes, meaning that if these children survive, their children, this will be passed on, it’s like changing the biology of the human being, the DNA of human beings,” he said.

[Marchmain]

Morality of gene editing on human embryos. Full article at link.

[Dave Wright]

Gene editing experiments on embryos are subject to significant ethical oversight worldwide with the exception of Chinese researchers. The standard practice is to use “triploid” embryos that formed accidently with 3 sets of chromosomes rather than the usual 2 (1 father , 1 mother). Triploid embryos produce non-viable fetuses which die within hours of birth if they survive to term at all.

[CharlesOConnell]

An issue is whether or not the gene editing is therapeutic, for the benefit of the person who is the subject of the experiment. What if you got a new, exotic illness that doctors couldn't figure out. Any testing would be for your benefit, unless the doctor's prime motive was to become rich and famous off of you.

[freedumb2003]

What could go wrong?