Genetic testing of embryos-Ethical considerations

Angela

Elite member
Messages
21,823
Reaction score
12,327
Points
113
Ethnic group
Italian
See:
https://www.statnews.com/2017/10/23/ivf-embryo-genetic-testing/

"Jessie and Samantha’s story speaks to an emerging ethical morass in the field of reproductive medicine: what to do when patients seeking to get pregnant select embryos with DNA that could lead to a disease or disability. Should clinicians’ desire to help their patients have children override concerns about possibly doing harm to those children? And what about cases in which patients — like Samantha and Jessie — end up with only one viable embryo through in vitro fertilization?"

"
The issue also pokes at a broader puzzle ethicists and experts are trying to reckon with as genetic testing moves out of the lab and further into the hands of consumers. People have access to more information about their own genes — or, in this case, about the genes of their potential offspring — than ever before. But having that information doesn’t necessarily mean it can be used to inform real-life decisions.A test can tell prospective parents that their embryo has an abnormal number of chromosomes in its cells, for example, but it cannot tell them what kind of developmental delays their child might have, or whether transferring that embryo into a womb will lead to a pregnancy at all. Families and physicians are gazing into five-day-old cells like crystal balls, seeking enlightenment about what might happen over a lifetime. Plus, the tests can be wrong."
 

This thread has been viewed 4174 times.

Back
Top