Génétique humaine et Embryologie

The Ethics of Human Genetic Engineering and Embryo

Abstract

Tim David

Reprogenetics is a subset of preimplantation genetic diagnosis, which is a well-established medical practise (PGD). PGD (prenatal diagnosis, or testing of foetal tissue for the presence of disease genes) allows couples at risk of transmitting a genetic disease to ensure that their future children are unaffected by the disease without having to go through the difficult process of prenatal diagnosis (i.e., testing of foetal tissue for the presence of disease genes) and having to make the difficult decision of terminating the pregnancy. PGD is taking a single cell from an eight-cell embryo (produced through in vitro fertilisation) and testing its DNA for the presence of one or more disease-associated genetic changes. The mother's uterus is then only implanted with embryos that do not have the illness mutation. PGD was originally utilised in clinical treatment in the early 1990s to determine the sex of embryos in order to reduce the risk of passing on fatal sex-linked illness genes to offspring. If there is a family history of Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), for example, parents may choose to have their embryos screened to distinguish between female and male embryos before implanting solely the female embryos.