The TV news tells me the first Genetically Modified Human was born today, but the only online article I've found so far is from months back, when the GMH was implanted:
That article makes it sound like they just screened egg cells, whereas the news claimed they altered her DNA. Not sure which is accurate... but the potential for conflict between
Purestrain Humans and
Transhumans would give me more to be paranoid about, so I'm going to trust the TV. It's never lied to me before.
P.S.: If you've never seen Gattaca, go put it in your netflix queue. It's now more relevant than ever. It's not really sci-fi, so much as noir detective film set in the near future. Slow-boiling character study with mystery elements.
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Of course, this is already standard procedure. With both of our kids, we had to sign a sheet of paper saying we'd been offered the amniotic fluid test for something -- maybe cerebral palsy -- and declined it. The doctor counseled us about the test, explaining the risks (there are some) and her feeling that the test isn't really worth doing unless you would consider "terminating the pregnancy" if it came back positive. We wouldn't have considered that result, so didn't opt for the test.
But I wouldn't be surprised to learn that people doing in-vitro fertilization already do this kind of screening a lot.
The news last night made this huge deal about it. Having never been a parent, I didn't have any reason to doubt them about this being revolutionary.
It's now beginning to sound like the only thing news-worthy here is that they were applying it to a new disease. Local TV coverage just blew it out of proportion to hook a fish. Should have known.
Next month, when my TV stops working, I'm really not going to miss it.
Slate had a rather long article about it, and it doesn't seem to break down into anything too revolutionary.
The family had 12 embryos fertilized, then tested them for the breast cancer gene. Once they found a clean one, that's the embryo they used.
Notably -- they've been doing this for a long time with things like Tay Sachs and such. I have no idea why this is such big news.
Side note -- we were offered genetic testing with both of our kids too. It's standard, as digital sextant says.
Even for a rabid pro-lifer, I fail to see how this story is any more significant than any other kind of IVF procedure. We have friends who had IVF and discarded embryos. How is this different? SeriouslY?
Fuckin' media.
Yeah, fuckin' media! Let's get 'em! I'm sharpening my pitchfork - you got any torches?
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