Gene Therapy?

[KeLe.GirL]

For those who dont know what it is gene therapy an approach to treating diseases by either modifying a persons genes or the correction of abnormal genes.

Many diff diseases are currently being tested on humans like cystic fibrosis, cardiovascular disease, infectious diseases such as AIDS and cancer.

But the treatment of all diseases? I dont really know about that. Will it be only for the rich, the people who can afford to buy a second chance at life or will it be universally available to all those suffering?

I don't know if I am too keen on this idea. I mean I did loose my BEST friend almost 6 years ago after his 3rd time getting cancer. What I wouldnt do to have him not to have suffered all that time or to have him here with me. But fixing the termanally ill may throw off the whole balance of mother nature. I don't know but the whole idea seems a little freaky to me.

[SLAVE2THEMUZIK]

Fuck throwing off the "balance of mother nature"..mother nature is the cause of these diseases!! so why not correct them if we are capable of developing such technology..anything that promotes the continuity of life...I'm for it!

[MsRay]

Originally posted by SLAVE2THEMUZIK
Fuck throwing off the "balance of mother nature"..mother nature is the cause of these diseases!! so why not correct them if we are capable of developing such technology..anything that promotes the continuity of life...I'm for it! But diseases do have a function in nature and ignoring that function; though, on the surface seemingly a great thing, it has serious consequences which were alluded to by Kelly (sp? ... :( ). These technologies are beginning to affect and will continue to affect the balance of nature and of society. There are ethical, social, legal, and myriad types of questions that need to be asked and reflected on.

Who will have ready access to these technologies?
Is extending life always right?
What happens when life expectancies increase, but population growth continues unabated?
Will we have enough resources for everyone?
What impact do these technologies have the evolution of humans?
Are we still evolving according to the rules of nature or have we taken over? Is that a good thing?

And it's not just gene therapy, it's entire fields such as bioengineering, nanotechnology, and genomics.

I don't believe we should renounce technology or feel that their no potential positives to a lot of these advancements, but I do believe we need to take a breather, to pause. We need to look at the implications of these wonders of science which our ethical, moral, belief, social, and legal systems are struggling to keep up with.

What happens when we develop the capability of extending productive, healthy, active life to 100 or 120 years? What happens to the retirement age? What happens to jobs?

We will be "designing" our children through their genotypes with the possibility of creating "super"-humans in that they will have no chance of heart disease, of certain cancers, and/or perfect vision (or enhanced vision). We these kids be favored in the real world for certain jobs as was the case in the movie Gattaca?

Granted these may just be flights of science fiction, but who can say what is or not possible now when we are getting better at xenotransplantation, or better yet, growing whole organs for replacement?

As much as it's fascinating, it does give me pause. By all means, we should proceed forward, but with caution and responsibility.

[KeLe.GirL]

Ray -

I put gene therapy right next to cloning. I am so against both of these scientific technologies. Neither of these will come to us without severe consequences. What will have to be compensated? Nothing in this world was meant to be perfect.

and yes you spelt it right ;)

[SLAVE2THEMUZIK]

Originally posted by Kel e grl
Ray -

I put gene therapy right next to cloning. I am so against both of these scientific technologies. Neither of these will come to us without severe consequences. What will have to be compensated? Nothing in this world was meant to be perfect.

and yes you spelt it right ;)

So your against the idea of a married couple that are incapable of conceiving a child due to their innate insufficiencies cloning their own child with their own genes?

Im not saying I am for each and every person utilizing gene therapy +/or cloning...but I am for the developement of the technologies and allowing it to be an option for ppl who choose to use it.

Im sure that if each and every human being on the planet opted for the gene therapy there would be problems down the road with adjusting to such "high grade lifeforms"...but...I beleive that we would somehow adapt...

[KeLe.GirL]

Originally posted by SLAVE2THEMUZIK
Im not saying I am for each and every person utilizing gene therapy +/or cloning...but I am for the developement of the technologies and allowing it to be an option for ppl who choose to use it.


and who is to decide who is an applicable candidate to use these technologies? Who is the privy and who gets pushed to the side to suffer while others get a second chance. I don't think that someone should have the power to decide, essentially, who lives and who dies, last time I checked it wasn’t a politician or scientist

[MsRay]

Originally posted by Kel e grl
Ray -

I put gene therapy right next to cloning. I am so against both of these scientific technologies. Neither of these will come to us without severe consequences. What will have to be compensated? Nothing in this world was meant to be perfect.

and yes you spelt it right ;) That may be true, but then the potential benefits may outweigh the consequences. What needs to happen is that we need to start figuring out how we are going to adapt so that when life as we know it changes, we're not left without any clothes.

I say this coming from my innate slant toward the world of science and a faith in our pursuit of understanding the world. And though by understanding and discovering the mysteries of the universe, we acquire the power to manipulate our world, this ability isn't always good. Just because something can be done does mean it should be done.

[SLAVE2THEMUZIK]

Originally posted by Kel e grl
and who is to decide who is an applicable candidate to use these technologies? Who is the privy and who gets pushed to the side to suffer while others get a second chance. I don't think that someone should have the power to decide, essentially, who lives and who dies, last time I checked it wasn’t a politician or scientist

Well I think its obvious in todays society who would be the applicable candidates...Money makes the world go round...
health care wether you like it or not is a business....what's the goal of a business? profit

[MsRay]

Originally posted by SLAVE2THEMUZIK
So your against the idea of a married couple that are incapable of conceiving a child due to their innate insufficiencies cloning their own child with their own genes?

Im not saying I am for each and every person utilizing gene therapy +/or cloning...but I am for the developement of the technologies and allowing it to be an option for ppl who choose to use it.

Im sure that if each and every human being on the planet opted for the gene therapy there would be problems down the road with adjusting to such "high grade lifeforms"...but...I beleive that we would somehow adapt... On the surface, this seems to be an easy answer, but what is that child? Is a clone a human? Worms reproduce asexually and that's defining feature of worms. Humans reproduce sexually. Conceptually, cloning is asexual reproduction. What does that make the clone? What is the legal definition of a clone? Does it have the same rights as non-cloned humans? Does the genome source of the clone have any property rights over the clone? It is technically his DNA.

What's the meaning of "reproduction" in terms of humans when it is through cloning? Why clone over adoption? What if a couple cloned themselves producing two clones, would those clones be siblings or married?

Here's an interesting scenario: Let's say we have a person and his clone. Let's say the clone was created when the source was 30. Let's say this clone commits a murder when he's 20 and the only hard evidence is a DNA sample. Let's also say that it is plausible that the source and the clone committed the murder. Who is guilty?

These are the kinds of things that will inevitably come up if we started cloning without some sort of throughout discussion on cloning's possibilities.

It's terrible when a couple is incapable of having children, but accepting cloning to solve this problem without real reflection is irresponsible and to me seemingly perverse.

I sympathize with them, but it is limited by the reality that natural born children are denied to a great many couples of various types around the world. I cannot accept currently that cloning should be expanded to humans based on a small minority of the population incapable of reproducing despite the many fertility techniques and procedures currently available. Perhaps in the future, if as a society we develop a new understanding to be able to integrate cloning into our world, or perhaps not, but the decision either cannot be made so early.

As for gene therapy, I truly feel that the benefits will outweigh any potential consequences, but the fact that we can do this should prime us for future developments. We moving to the point where we can manipulate genomes of whole species. Many agriculture companies do that very thing now. They are creating farm goods that are resistant to insects of various sorts or that are bigger than they naturally are. And this isn't old fashioned selective breeding, but the movement of pieces of code between different species. This new wonder of farm science is already starting to have global consequences. "GM" foods are banned in parts of Europe which have caused tensions with the U.S. and other international organizations. "Whole food" movements have sprung up that market themselves as "GM"-free or additive-free.

Here we are seeing economic consequences and benefits. The benefits being bigger food and more food (since less die to disease and insects) means more food to go around. Why would anyone argue against this? Because we don't know what the long-term effects are in eating food that's been altered in this way. If we're lucky, the ill effects will be inconsequential if they exist at all. If not, we might see something that's been occurring in the U.S. When the feeding of all the preservatives, hormones, and whatever else they add to the mix to cows produced more milk, it was a great thing, but the effects of these additives are starting to show most glaringly in our younger population. Kids are entering puberty a lot sooner as generations have gone by. Those additives have been passed along to the milk and into us.

It may seem like a given that we tend to do things first and ask questions later, but I don't see how that's going to work in the future. We starting to play with life itself and in effect redefining what it means to be human. In a hundred years, will some of us be walking around with the vision of eagles? Will some of us have the olfactory prowess of the bloodhound? Will some of us have gills as did one of the characters in the show "SeaQuest?"

I don't see why not since we can already insert genes from jellyfish into mice and make them glow. The mice are no longer mice, but a new species and we created it.

This is what's coming and I for one want to make sure we really thought about all that we're doing so that pandora's box never even gets a peak.

[MsRay]

Originally posted by Kel e grl
and who is to decide who is an applicable candidate to use these technologies? Who is the privy and who gets pushed to the side to suffer while others get a second chance. I don't think that someone should have the power to decide, essentially, who lives and who dies, last time I checked it wasn’t a politician or scientist This situation exists now. Our health system is such that some will be privy to better care than others.

And speaking of politicians deciding who lives and who dies:
Last week, a feeding tube that had sustained Mrs. Schiavo since 1990 was removed after her husband, Michael, won a series of court battles based on his contention that she once said she never wanted to be kept alive artificially.

But after the Legislature's action on Tuesday, Mr. Bush ordered the feeding resumed, and yesterday Mrs. Schiavo was receiving nourishment through a new feeding tube. Mr. Schiavo's lawyers were contemplating their next move. (http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/23/national/23STAY.html)A Slate.com (http://slate.msn.com//?id=2090249&) article uses the story as why one person is designated the person to determine the fate of an individual such as Mrs. Schiavo.

[KeLe.GirL]

we really live in a fucked up ass backwards world.

[SLAVE2THEMUZIK]

Originally posted by Kel e grl
we really live in a fucked up ass backwards world.

You can say that again...I just got finished this week with dealing with a patient who had a DNR (do not resuscitate) and her health care proxy discontinued her feeding tube, fluids and meds (EVEN PAIN MEDS!!!!)....but her case went through an ethics commitee and apparently it was the "right" decision....even though she wasn't suffering from any termindal illnesses!!!!!!!!!!!

it's disgusting

[KeLe.GirL]

you work in a hospital?

[SLAVE2THEMUZIK]

Originally posted by Kel e grl
you work in a hospital?

Technically, yes but i dont get paid for it lol...Im doing my med-surg rotations right now...Im a nursing student :buck

[SLAVE2THEMUZIK]

n-m

[KeLe.GirL]

Originally posted by SLAVE2THEMUZIK
Technically, yes but i dont get paid for it lol...Im doing my med-surg rotations right now...Im a nursing student :buck

ah ha so i can now see why your stand point is what it is. But then again I also work in the medical field, indirectly.