A prestigious British bioethics group has given the thumbs up to a controversial procedure that uses eggs from two different women to produce an embryo in order to help couples avoid the risk of having a baby with certain genetic diseases.
MSNBC is reporting that the Nuffield Council on Bioethics said this week that the procedure should be allowed if it proves safe enough. Currently, altering embryos in such a manner is only allowed for research purposes in the UK, and British law forbids the implantation of altered embryos into humans.
“If these treatments are successful, these children would be among the first in the world to have a genetic connection to not two people, but three people,” said Geoff Watts, who chaired a Nuffield inquiry into the issue.
“There are a number of ethical questions that arise and needed to be considered. . . . If further research shows these techniques to be sufficiently safe and effective, we think it would be ethical for families to use them … provided they receive an appropriate level of information and support.”
The procedure involves using two eggs, one from the mother and one from a donor. The nucleus of the donor egg is removed, leaving the mitochondria intact and replaced by the mother’s nucleus. The resulting embryo has properly functioning mitochondria from the donor — resulting in a potentially healthy baby, albeit one with three parents.
This method would allow scientists to control for mistakes in the mitochondria’s genetic code that can result in a variety of diseases such as muscular dystrophy, epilepsy, heart problems and mental retardation.
“If these novel techniques are adequately proven to be acceptably safe and effective as treatments, it would be ethical for families to use them,” said the report, which was released on June 12.
Many experts agree. “We have an opportunity to allow women with mitochondrial (problems) to become mothers without facing the agonizing possibility of passing their condition onto their child,” said Marita Pohlschmidt, director of research at the Muscular Dystrophy Campaign, in a statement to MSNBC.
She went on to urge the UK government to move quickly to get the technique ready for use on humans.
However, many believe this new method will open the door to the practice of genetically modifying babies, a substantial risk considering the fact that just one in 6,500 babies born in Britain have serious mitochondrial disorders.
“Just as Frankenstein’s creation was produced by sticking together bits from many different bodies, it seems that there is no grotesquerie, no violation of the norms of nature or human culture at which scientists and their bioethical helpers will balk,” said David King, director of Human Genetics Alert, to the BBC.
“The proposed techniques are both unnecessary, and highly dangerous in the medium term, since they set a precedent for allowing the creation of genetically modified designer babies.”
He added that such techniques cross “what is normally considered the most important ethical line in the prevention of a new eugenics” and this was “precisely how slippery slopes get created.”
The pro-life community is also against the technique. Pro-life campaigners at the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC) also criticized the research.
“Creating embryonic children in the laboratory abuses them, by subjecting them to unnatural processes. These techniques are both destructive and dangerous and therefore unethical,” Anthony Ozimic, communications manager for the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children (SPUC), said in a statement.
Even though the Nuffield Council is an independent body, it has a long history of influencing biomedical policy in the UK, and the authors of the new report are hoping their input will be factor in deliberations to legalize the procedures.
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