Ethical
row erupts over designer babies breakthrough
By JULIE WHELDON,
Daily Mail
New fears were raised last night that science is moving inexorably to a
world of designer babies.
Campaigners reacted with alarm to two developments in genetic screening.
See also...
• Commentary: We don't need to wipe out autism...we need to care more
• Fertility laws: what does the future hold?
UK experts revealed an improved method which could allow hundreds of
couples to avoid the risk of having children with a killer disease. It
will be quicker and more accurate than existing screening.
More disturbingly, a London hospital applied to use IVF sex selection
techniques to help couples with a family history of autism - by
destroying all their male embryos.
There is no reliable genetic test for autism, but boys are more likely
than girls to have the condition. Implanting only females would
dramatically reduce the risk, but mean many perfectly healthy male
embryos would be discarded.
Ethical campaigners said the move was yet another example of how the
goalposts were being moved ever wider.
Josephine Quintavalle, of Comment on Reproductive Ethics, said: 'It is
not about taking an embryo and curing it, but about diagnosing and then
throwing away.'
Simone Aspis, of the British Council of Disabled People, warned:
'Screening out autism would breed a fear that anyone who is different
in any way will not be accepted. It would create a society where only
perfection is valued.'
Scientists at University College Hospital in London have applied to the
watchdog Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority for permission
for the screening.
Rates of autism have risen tenfold in the last decade and half a
million British families are now affected. Around ten per cent of cases
are thought to be hereditary.
Professor Joy Delhanty of UCH said her team would create embryos using
IVF and test them at a few days old to see if they were boys or girls.
Only girls would be implanted into the mother.
Professor Delhanty said: 'Normally we would not consider this unless
there were at least two boys affected in the immediate family.'
She pointed out that many couples in such a situation would be fertile
and might not want to go through gruelling IVF.
An HFEA spokesman said the authority had a duty to consider any new
applications. But Miss Quintavalle said: 'The requirements are getting
wider and wider and the science can be more and more hypothetical.
'This getting rid of male embryos is shoddy and shocking. We need to
see more evidence on the genetic causes of autism.'
In a second highly-significant development, UK scientists said they
have found a totally new way to spot problem genes and ensure that only
disease-free embryos are implanted.
The technique has already been used in several pregnancies. Three are
for couples with particular genetic defects which trigger cystic
fibrosis but are not covered by existing tests. Two are for couples who
carry defects for the muscle-wasting disorder Duchenne Muscular
Dystrophy. One is in a woman with a rare genetic disorder which leads
to pancreatic tumours.
The new screening technique, called Pre-implantation Genetic
Haplotyping (PGH) was developed by Professor Peter Braude of Guy's and
St Thomas' Hospital in London. He will tell the annual conference of
the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology in Prague
today that it represents a major step forward.
'It is more accurate, highly reliable and available for a whole range
of disorders,' said Professor Braude. 'It opens the doors to all sorts
of conditions.'
Doctors can currently use a technique called Pre-implantation Genetic
Diagnosis (PGD) to test embryos for some inherited cancers and
disorders such as Huntington's Disease. But scientists must know the
precise defect they are seeking and it can take up to a year to devise
a test for each problem.
Professor Braude's method, which costs £4,100 a time, can cover
many more genetic mutations and diseases.
Ultimately it could even allow scientists to weed out thousands of
genetic diseases.
The news was greeted with approval by Linda Ball, 37, (pictured right)
whose son Daniel, five, has Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy. Girls can
carry the condition but only boys suffer its devastating effects.
Daniel already has problems with his legs and must wear splints at
night. His parents must face the fact that he is unlikely to live
beyond his teenage years.
Mrs Ball, from Daventry, Northamptonshire, knew the disease ran in her
family because her brother Vaun died of it when he was 18.
But when she became pregnant, she said, she could not bring herself to
have an abortion, even though she knew she was having a son and there
was a 25 per cent chance he would be affected.
Now she is delighted that the new test will give her baby daughter
Helena 'a real choice' when she too decides to become a mother.
Mrs Ball said: 'Of course there is debate about when a life becomes a
life. But when you know Duchenne and that my little boy is going to
have a lot of pain and suffering, it make things different.'
For the test, scientists take blood samples from a couple and their
affected child, or another relative, to work out where the problem gene
lies.
Using IVF, they create several embryos and remove a single cell from
each when they are a few days old, to get the DNA.
This is grown overnight in the laboratory which provides a much larger
genetic sample.
From this the scientists can spot if the embryo is carrying the problem
chromosome or a disease-free version. Only the healthy ones are then
implanted.
The team next hope to offer PGH for disorders such as Fragile X
Syndrome, Myotonic Dystrophy and Prader-Willi Syndrome.
But Josephine Quintavalle repeated her warning against further
extensions of screening.
She said: 'I am horrified to think of these people sitting in judgment
on these embryos and saying who should live and who should die.'
She said huge strides had been made to prolong life expectancy for
victims of cystic fibrosis and gene therapy was looking increasingly
promising promising for tackling the condition.