Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis

Elaine Kelley

It would be difficult to find political support in our American society today for policies of infanticide of all Females and brown-eyed babies. It would even be hard to garner support for the killing of babies who will need glasses, or even those who have asthma. Would our American society, the one that so often declares itself an example to the world, ever support the “mercy killing” of babies that were born deformed or were developmentally challenged? I am not sure if there is a poll on the future of infanticide in the United States, but my best educated guess is that such ideas are simply unthinkable in our culture. A simple determinant of right and wrong in a society is to ask the question, “is it a good idea in our culture to…?” (Condit August 24th). Yet many ethical issues cannot be simplified to such a level. Reproductive technology is one of those issues where lines of ethics are blurred, boundaries of religion are broken and politics is constantly racing to keep up with the new science. One aspect of reproductive technology that is new and includes an immense span of uncharted territory is Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis, or PGD. PGD is not synonymous with infanticide, nor is it necessarily a tool for eugenics or marketable designer babies. Yet PGD’s possible relation to the latter calls for public dialogue, specifically in our social and political realm in the United States, about where the legal boundaries should be, and what ethical principles we have that back up those potential policies. The U.S. educational system reveres societies like ancient Greece, and its many philosophers including Aristotle and Plato. Yet few are aware that the Greeks practiced blatant infanticide and dangerous genetic selection. Debora L. Spar writes in The Baby Business that the ancient Greeks “routinely left unwanted babies to die and deformed infants were killed at birth” (101). Plato writes in his “The Republic” that “the offspring of the inferior, or of the

better when they chance to be deformed, will be put away in some mysterious, unknown place, as they should be” (Spar 97). Plato praises such practices; and our society’s philosophers and political theorists (among others) praise Plato’s works. Yet this does not require that these intellectuals admire every sentiment in Plato’s writings. Many people in the same academic category extol the writings of Aristotle, but do not commend slavery, which Aristotle considered natural. Nevertheless we must take a moment to realize that slavery was, after all, at one point an acceptable way to sustain the economy of the Old South. There is no logic here that says we will one day practice infanticide due to our reverence of Plato, but it is important to recognize how our society’s values have changed dramatically throughout time. Perhaps the unthinkable needs to be thought of, so that we can stop it as it is just beginning. Time will only tell if we are in fact just beginning to head down a perilous road in the United States, or if we are actually on the threshold of a serious technological breakthrough that will ultimately make our people happier, healthier and all-round better citizens. Reproductive technology, and specifically PGD, is one such practice that needs to be carefully analyzed as a possible hazardous trend. PGD involves the removing of one cell from a recently formed eight-cell embryo. The cell is then tested for devastating diseases such as Tay-Sachs or Fanconi. There is, however, already the capability to distinguish gender, or whether a child is likely to have a non-fatal affliction such as Down syndrome. Science may soon offer possible solutions through genetic selection to problems such as cancer or even obesity (Spar 98). When this happens, unless legality forbids it, there will be no stopping science to finding genetic markers for eye color, hair color, height intelligence or athletic ability. Spar notes that there are specialists in the business of gender selection already. Jeffrey Steinberg charges thousands of dollars for such a procedure (99). An online website titled simply Sex (Gender) Selection boasts that they offer “family balance through modern science” (Fertility Institutes1). This euphemism is potentially a threat because it carries with it no warning of concerns for a world where every couple can select out a less-desirable gender. It is clear in

our society that the so-called weaker sex are females. Whether this stereotype of weakness is generally believed or not does not change the overwhelming evidence of discrimination against women such as women receiving only 72 cents per every dollar that a man receives for the same job (Condit, Oct. 21). Even those who recognize that men and women are essentially equal in value and ability cannot deny that women are more likely to face discrimination. If all couples act on this logical conclusion by selecting-out all their female embryos, the result would be catastrophic. While technology currently allows for little more than early determination of disease predisposition and gender selection, women and those with certain diseases are not the only people who might be prevented from existing. People of minority races, namely blacks, have nothing to fear of white couples “selecting them out.” Science tells us that two biological, white parents would not have black embryos to choose from. Given this, African Americans like Dorothy Roberts do not fear this technology on a individual level: one, they have already been born – and two, no one white couple alone has the option of selecting out a black embryo. Dorothy Roberts is wary of PGD based on the principle of such potentially gene-obsessed technology, and the implications it carries with it. Roberts concludes, “Black folks are skeptical about any obsession with genes. They know that their genes have been considered undesirable and that their alleged genetic inferiority has been used for centuries to justify their exclusion from the economic, political and social mainstream” (Roberts 261). Gender and race are not the only categories wherein certain traits are historically less desirable in our society. There is a chance of this technology leading to movement towards elimination of all homosexuals and transsexuals. Society has made sexual orientation as well as gender identity/expression another category, not dissimilar to race and gender, that gives institutions and people who drive them a reason to discriminate. If science proves traits of sexual orientation and gender identity (different from the sex) as genetic variants, then why wouldn’t many couples (of any opinion of the variants) begin to select-out these individuals. The list of minorities that would be likely not selected as

embryos is endless. Many couples may see embryo selection as the ethical or “right thing to do” for their unborn children. They may try to save them from non-fatal, but abnormal conditions. An indirect effect that I see of hyper-development of PGD would be a drastic change in the role of parent. Everything we know about the parent-child relationship will change if parents are able to design their children. Not only will parents expect their children to do their best and achieve, but parents will also begin to design their children with the abilities they will one day force them to use. Those who select the allegedly most intelligent embryos might make early plans for medical school, whether their child has an interest in the field or not. Parents may not wait twenty years for their son or daughter to become the adults they will be; but rather parents may begin to tell their children who they will be, or worse who they have to be. Just imagine a scenario where a parent says, “I didn’t pay $10,000 for you to turn out as a starving artist/bisexual/dyslexic /etc.” These are all issues that must be publicly addressed, before they become realities. The concept of designing a child to have a pre-determined life path is still not as extreme as if one initially brings a child into the world solely to serve one purpose. This scenario is not a futuristic prediction, but rather something that has already occurred. Lisa Nash conceived using IVF in order to select an embryo whose marrow would match her daughter’s, and could be used to save her daughter’s life from Fanconi Anemia. Nash gave birth to a son, Adam, whose blood was taken during delivery, and would help his sister recover from her fatal disease. There is a beautiful picture painted of the Nash’s with their newborn son, and daughter who truly experienced a renewed life. Yet the concept looms over the Nash’s story that technology now presents us with the possibility of creating one child to save another (Spar 98). There is no black and white rulebook for this type of situations. This is a gray area in the world of ethics.

In situations as the proceeding where many religious, political and ethical viewpoints within our society can still see the gray area of such a decision,

how are we to make public policy regarding the issue? My answer is that legal guidelines are absolutely necessary, but not a simple law allowing all or none of technology such as IVF and PGD. Regulation on the federal level is what I would call for in the United States, but history arguably tells us that the federal government’s job is to react slowly and deliberately to new potential crimes rather than to make legislation in attempt to prevent them. In order to best understand why legislation is necessary, I think the government will wait for an actual case to come forth. For example, I think the way that these technologies will eventually be regulated is by a U.S. Supreme Court decision that will overturn or affirm a lower-court decision. The lower court decision will likely be a ruling made either to strike down or affirm a state statute. This is how I envision the legal process coming to light. Ideally those state statutes would begin popping up around the country today, before practices get too extreme. I think the biggest obstacle to state legislatures’ proposing and passing bills about reproductive technology is a lack of understanding of what IVF and PGD really mean. Lobbyists need to speak with state senators and delegates about what technology is available today, how it’s being used and how future technologies will be used in the future. Obstacles are once again a lack of understanding, and additionally lack of support for earmarked women’s or liberal issues. Nancy Lublin describes in Pandora’s Box: Feminism Confronts Reproductive Technology the characteristics of Technophiles and Technophobes, meaning those who fear and those who fully endorse technology, specifically technology that “interferes with the womb” (Lublin 23). Lublin brings to light that there is a feminist perspective that such technology is a liberating agent for women, and there is the ecofeminist who does not support said technology. An ecofeminist would likely point out that fighting the biology that so often creates the basis for inequality among men and women is not the solution. An ecofeminist, according to Lublin, would more likely take the viewpoint that “biology is the source and not the enemy of feminist revolution”(45). I agree with the standpoint that technology is to be welcomed in general as an agent of change, but I feel there are distinct boundaries that need to be established

in our society in this realm. Only long, intense, public scrutiny and dialogue about where the line should be drawn can produce solutions that make sense in our culture, or ethical solutions. Technology developed to make our lives easier should be viewed with less legal scrutiny than should the development and marketing of technology created to interfere with the very creation of who we are in the deepest and most basic form. Whether one believes strongly in reason, science or religion, it seems to make sense in our society that humans should not be entrusted with deciding what type of human DNA should or should not continue to occupy the planet.

Works Cited

Lublin, Nancy. Pandora’s Box: Feminism Confronts Reproductive Technology. New York: Roman and Littlefield, 1998. 75-114.

Roberts, Dorothy. Killing the Black Body. New York: Random House, 1997.

Fertility Institutes. Sexselection.net. 26. Nov. 2006. 2006, http://www. sexselection.net/pages/626742/index.htm

Spar, Deborah L. The Baby Business. Boston: Harvard, 2006.