Scientists and ethicists from across the globe gathered in Washington, D.C., last week to debate the promises and perils of a new form of genetic engineering.
There is a new gene editing technique called CRISPR, which allows scientists to remove and replace damaged or defective human genes with healthy ones faster, more cheaply and with more precision than ever before, and to make those alterations heritable.
The new technology has applications for plants and animals. But the controversy lies in its possible use to manipulate human sperm, eggs and embryos.
The emerging science promises to improve human well-being because single-gene disorders are responsible for thousands of diseases afflicting hundreds of millions of people. But the slope from treating serious disease to generating non-medical enhancements is steep and slippery.
Gene editing raises a host of practical questions. Who will receive treatment? Will the procedure be covered by insurance? Will there be any limits on what may be altered? It also raises more existential questions over the meaning of life, what it means to be human and to live a good life.
Many conservatives and people of faith are concerned about the implications for human dignity. Liberals and others are worried that new therapies will give extra advantages to people already physically and intellectually gifted, and will widen the gulf between society’s haves and have-nots. These are reasonable fears.
At the moment, there is wide bipartisan agreement against embryonic gene-editing. The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director John Holdren has written that embryo manipulation is a “line that shouldn’t be crossed.” Similar language has been used by National Institutes of Health Director Francis Collins.
But that consensus may be starting to erode. As New York University bioethicist Arthur Caplan argues on the Washington Examiner‘s website, “The sick cannot ethically be held hostage to worries about possible future dangers. Those need to be handled on their own terms. The old rule against genetically altering heritable traits is history.”
Dozens of countries already outlaw editing of germ-line cells. In the U.S., while it is legal to conduct such research privately, the National Institutes of Health does not fund it. And as the Examiner‘s Paige Winfield Cunningham reported last week, several bills in the House of Representatives would ban government agencies from spending federal funds on the modification of genes in the human embryo.
Some lawmakers and scientists, including one of CRISPR’s inventors, are calling for a moratorium on heritable gene editing until more can be discerned about its safety and efficacy and until better ethical guidelines can be written and an agreement can be reached. This is a reasonable first step.
In addition, more needs to be done to prohibit unscrupulous clinics from offering enhancements to the public. The burden should be placed on scientists and clinics to prove that human life is not destroyed and women are not exploited.
Also, as Caplan argues, independent review committees with no commercial interest in the technology should be established to review all aspects of the new technology and its possible effects on patients. These and other steps should be taken now, as the first human trials of CRISPR technology may be only a couple of years away.
Caution and prudence are always the best policy when addressing rapidly evolving technologies where human life and dignity are at stake. This is especially true when leading scientists use words and phrases such as “revolutionary,” “breakthrough,” “game-changer” and “tip of the iceberg” to describe it. Prudence and deference are essential when altering the work of a brilliant author. That principle is particularly true when God is the author.
