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First UK Babies Born after New Method of Eugenic Embryo Screening

By Gudrun Schultz

LONDON, United Kingdom, November 14, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The birth of two babies in Britain at the beginning of November marked the start of a new phase in the  genetic screening of human embryos, a process condemned as eugenics by the international pro-life movement for attempting to prevent the birth of people with disabilities.

Parents Catherine and Jim Greenstreet both carry a cell for cystic fibrosis, BBC News reported today. Their five-year-old daughter has the disease--her twin brother does not. The Greenstreets had their lab-fertilized embryos screened by a new process known as pre-implantation genetic heliotyping, a process that examines the entire DNA code of an embryo to identify the presence of potential genetic disorders.

The controversial technology requires the fertilization and destruction of multiple embryos in order to increase the likelihood that one without genetic question marks will be found. Following pre-implantation genetic diagnosis, or PGD, babies that show genetic markers indicating the possible presence of genetic disease are destroyed, while genetically “clean” embryos are implanted in the mother and permitted to come to term.

After undergoing careful scrutiny of their genetic code, which showed no problem genes,  babies Freddie and Thomas were selected for implantation and development.

Josephine Quintavalle, with Comment on Reproductive Ethics, said the science is a rejection of people born with disabilities, in an interview with BBC News. “It is not about the babies who have been born. It’s about the babies who have not been allowed to be born.

“It sends a particularly bad message to children with cystic fibrosis - that society would prefer that they had not been born.”

Professor Peter Braude, head of women’s health at King’s College and clinical director of the genetic screening programme, defended the technique, saying, “[pre-implantation genetic diagnosis] can make an enormous difference for some families who have repeatedly miscarried, lost children through serious genetic disease, or are living with a child suffering from a serious genetic disease.

“For these couples it allows them the best chance of avoiding a serious genetic disorder being diagnosed in pregnancy and, in some cases, the need for a termination of pregnancy.”

As a further source of concern to opponents of genetic screening, however, research has shown that babies conceived using in vitro fertilization techniques have a dramatically increased likelihood of carrying birth defects.

Recent studies from the United States, Finland and Australia show an increase in genetic disorders in IVF babies as high as 40 percent. Furthermore, the presence of a gene for diseases such as cystic fibrosis and Duchenne muscular dystrophy does not guarantee the child will actually exhibit the condition.

See related LifeSiteNews coverage:

42% of IVF Ova Carry Genetic Abnormalities New Studies Show
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/oct/05101905.html"http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2005/oct/05101905.html

UK Embryo Authority Gives License for Eugenic 'Search and Destroy' Embryo Screening
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2004/nov/04110107.html

Screening IVF Babies For Defects Poised to Leap to Whole New Level
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2006/jan/06010606.html

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