Designer Babies

Designer babies are the term to describe the future of modifying or selecting our children’s genes for desirable characteristics, both medical and cosmetic. It’s an interesting topic which many people or communities have given their opinions.

Couples have opportunity to screen the gender of the children and the genetic diseases since a few years ago. But recently, scientists have made rapid advances in our ability to modify and change genes. So that means the couples are able to “cure” the characteristics which they don’t like by replacing the DNA. The couples can select their desirable characteristics such as gender, eye colour, hair colour, etc when they pay some companies to do so. But is this morally? Are we destroying the rules of the nature? Is this good for the children and parents?

How is it done?



Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis (PGD)
Advanced reproductive techniques involve using In-Vitro Fertilisation to fertilize eggs with sperm in 'test-tubes' outside the mother's body in a laboratory. These techniques allow doctors and parents to reduce the chance that a child will be born with a genetic disorder. Only selected embryos are implanted back into the mother's womb.

What are the pros of designer babies?

-It could allow the parents to screen embryos for genetic diseases and select healthy embryo

-“cure” the genetic diseases in embryos by replacing faulty sections of DNA with healthy DNA

-the technique could weed out the X-linked disorders including hemophilia, Duchene muscular dystrophy and Fragile X syndrome

Take the cases of some families:

The case of Cindy and John Whitley, their first child died at the age of 9 months from a deadly genetic disorder called spinal muscular atrophy. Genetic analysis uncovered that the Whitley’s statistically had a 1 in 4 chance of creating a child with spinal muscular atrophy each time they conceived. Unwilling to risk having another child with the deadly disorder, the Whitley’s used PGD to conceive three children, all healthy.

Take the other case of the Collinses family. This technology allows them to pick the sex of their child. It was first used to select for health due to the X-linked disorders.

Some couples are not able to have children because their children will have a genetic disease and die before they are born. These technologies could allow them to have healthy babies. For them, it is really good for them.

The social and ethical implications:

-Is this technique 100% safe? In recent years, there have been several deaths due to genetic-engineering. There are still huge risks that we may produce physical change. What if a designer baby is born with characteristics that the parents didn’t expect to have? It may probably change the life of the child and his family.

-There would be imbalance between rich people and poor people. This technique is very expensive, people may think why should only rich people be able to eradicate the genetic diseases, but the poor people are not.


-Will it lead to happier parents and children? What would the designer children think? Will they against the genetic changes that their parents chose for them? Will this lead to other social problems? What if they were designed for some purposes such as to help their siblings?

-Is this morally and is this unnatural? It feels like the couples are going to shop a baby that they want, they choose some desirable characteristics from a list of options, and then pay money. It sounds unnatural.

-If designer babies become a trend, it may cause social pressure and comparisons. Also, other problems need to consider is, will discrimination against the people born with disabilities.

Designer babies may be good for some couples that could not have a healthy child. It could reduce the chance to have genetic disorder. It may can save the child from suffering genetic diseases. But if some couples want to custom a baby just because they want a child with good-looking, it may be unnatural and will cause many other social problems.

Reference:
http://singularityhub.com/2009/02/25/designer-babies-like-it-or-not-here-they-come/
http://www.bionetonline.org/English/content/db_cont1.htm
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,989987,00.html