Ethical Issues in Genetic Engineering and Transgenics

… animals, microbes, and plants in …, 2004

1996

This paper examines aspects of the ethical impact of advances in genetics, and the difficulty of distinguishing between therapeutic (or "corrective") and "enhancement" genetic engineering. Objections to germline engineering are also considered.

The National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly, 2006

Center for Inquiry, 2007

Comparative and Functional Genomics, 2003

The point of the present study is to illustrate and, if possible, promote the existing link between genomics and ethics, taking the example of cloned and transgenic animals. These ‘new animals’ raise theoretical and practical problems that concern applied ethics. We will explore more particularly an original strategy showing that it is possible, starting from philosophical questioning about the nature of identity, to use a genomic approach, based on amplification fragment length polymorphism (AFLP) and methylation-sensitive amplification polymorphism (MSAP) detection, to provide useful tools to define more rigorously what cloned animals are, by testing their genetic and epigenetic identity. We expect from the future results of this combined approach to stimulate the creativity of the philosophical and ethical reflection about the impact of biotechnology on animals, and to increase scientific involvement in such issues.

One of the most important applications of transgenic animals for medical purposes is to transplant their organs into human's body, an issue which has caused a lot of ethical and scientific discussions. we can divide the ethical arguments to two comprehensive groups; the first group which is known as deontological critiques (related to the action itself regardless of any results pointing the human or animal) and the second group, called the consequentialist critiques (which are directly pointing the consequences of the action). The latter arguments also can be divided to two subgroups. In the first one which named anthropocentrism, just humankind has inherent value in the moral society, and it studies the problem just from a human-based point of view while in second named, biocentrism all the living organism have this value and it deals specially with the problem from the animal-based viewpoint. In this descriptive-analytic study, ethical issues were retrieved from books, papers, international guidelines, thesis, declarations and instructions, and even some weekly journals using keywords related to transgenic animals, organ, and transplantation. According to the precautionary principle with the strong legal and ethical background, due to lack of accepted scientific certainties about the safety of the procedure, in this phase, transplanting animal's organs into human beings have the potential harm and danger for both human and animals, and application of this procedure is unethical until the safety to human will be proven. Ethical issues of transplanting organs from transgenic animals into human beings. Cell J. 2014; 16(3): 353-360.

2019

The development of biotechnologies, as well as the emergence of genetic engineering and other innovations, promises great benefits, but it could also have a negative impact on the development of the human species and nature. Genetics is an area of research with an impressive history of evolution and significant practical advances that influence human experience. In 1953, Crick and Watson identified the structure of DNA. By the early 1970s, scientists succeeded in isolating genetic material from one species and attaching it to the genetic material of other species, thereby bringing about genetic engineering. In the same decade, the foundation for a program in gene therapy was established via the discovered possibility of identifying the genetic background of different pathologies. During its development, this field of research gathered supporters and opponents. Supporters point to successful achievements, such as solving the food problem, creating food with a higher medical value, potential development of food vaccines, treatment of genetic mutations, prevention of diseases in children in the prenatal period, extending the human life span, and prevention of diseases using genetic tests. Opponents highlight the risks of genetic defects, limited genetic diversity, increasing inequalities, and emergence of eugenics. This article analyzes some ethical issues that arise in practice from the use of genetic testing, gene therapy, and germ-line therapy, topics that are increasingly discussed in European context.

In May 2009, the journal 'Nature' published an article by Erika Sasaki et al. outlining a research development in biomedical science that, the authors argue, will provide new possibilities for using nonhuman primates in experiments for human health benefits. The authors claim that their research offers the potential for the reproduction of transgenic marmosets who, because of their “close genetic relations with humans” (523), might be extremely useful in advances designed to reduce the risks from a range of human health hazards. By conducting a critical analysis of the article, I will explore moral questions connected with experiments on nonhuman animals, in order to reflect upon assumptions central to claims about the progress that such nonhuman animal experiments are said to represent. My discussion is rooted in sociological theorizing about risk because, as Sasaki and her colleagues’ work demonstrates, biogenetics is being used to amplify risks to nonhuman animal health for the purpose of reducing risks to human health. Sociological theory allows us to examine assumptions about distinctions between humans and nonhuman animals, and among nonhuman animals, that intensify the commodification of nonhuman animals. Critical discourse analysis allows us to unveil assumptions made by Sasaki et al. that serve a logic of scientific advancement driven by human preoccupation with human benefits at the expense of nonhuman animals, which, I conclude, conflicts with human moral progress. My aims are reflected in the structure of the paper. The opening section explores risk and human health with a focus on the ways in which humans have sought, via biomedical research, to reduce human risks from health hazards. This is followed by consideration of how experiments using nonhuman animals have been utilized in the quest to diminish human health risks. This leads me to Sasaki et al.’s (2009) article. By using a critical discourse analytical approach, I reflect upon notions of “progress” as rooted in the aspiration to transfer to nonhuman animals a range of health hazards that we seek to eliminate in the human. I conclude that interfering with the genetics of nonhuman animals with the aim of engendering in them a predisposition to develop health hazards that we want to eliminate in humans represents human degeneration rather than progress.