Liberal Studies

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the alteration of genes within non-reproductive cells, all cells excluding sperm and eggs, thus theoretically having no influence upon the genetic make-up of future generations. However, germ-line gene therapy is the specific alteration of sperm or egg, thus having not only an effect upon the immediate progeny, but also on all successive generations.
Yet, before the ethical implications of such practices can be discussed, one must have an idea of why such procedures would be developed in the first place. Many of the most degenerative and dehabilitating diseases: Huntington’s chorea, sickle-cell anemia, Duchenne muscular dystrophy, hemophilia and some “2,800 [other] specific conditions are known to be caused by defects (mutations) in just one of the patient’s genes.”1 These genes normally code for the production of a specific enzyme, but when the gene is defective, either the protein is not produced or is altered in such a way that it no longer ...

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but whether or not it ought to be done in the first place. This debate has been searing ever since the early 90’s when the first gene therapy procedures were preformed on human subjects.
Proponents and opponents of gene therapy generally agree that somatic therapy is “further extension” of the same medical field that has brought us “organ transplants, radiation therapy and in vitro fertilization.”3 If one pictures a person with a hereditary disease like Diabetes, it would make perfect sense, both ethically and financially, for such a person to undergo a gene treatment. Through alteration of his genes, this would allow him to produce and regulate insulin ...

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