OTTAWA, May 3, 2001 (LSN.ca) – Health Minister Allan Rock appeared today before the Standing Committee on Health to present draft legislation on New Reproductive Technologies. From a pro-life perspective the proposed legislation is fundamentally flawed from beginning to end. While the legislation does ban cloning, both reproductive and therapeutic, the legislation allows for the destructive use of human embryos for research purposes. The document speaks of respecting “human dignity” on the part of the human embryos but then goes on to allow experimentation on these tiny helpless human beings.
The document specifically allows for “the derivation of stem cells from already existing embryos” which, the document fails to mention, causes the death of the living human embryo.
The document states in its preamble: “assisted human reproduction techniques benefit individuals and society in general.” This statement is considered to be false by most pro-life and pro-family observers. While assisted human reproduction by natural means (ie. Napro-technology or Natural Family Planning) is beneficial to society, artificial means of assisted reproduction, referring most commonly to in vitro fertilization (IVF), is often considered an affront to human dignity. It is well established that IVF results in the death of over 80% of the human embryos created.
The proposed legislation bans: Cloning of Human Beings Therapeutic cloning Germ line genetic alteration Development of an embryo outside a woman’s womb beyond the accepted 14 day limit Creation of human embryos solely for research purposes Creating an embryo from another embryo or foetus Transplanting reproductive material from animals into humans Use of human reproductive material previously transplanted into an animal Gender preference or sex selection
The legislation would allow for: The derivation of stem cells from already existing embryos (which causes the death of the living human embryo) The creation of chimeras – “a human embryo into which a cell of a non-human life form has been introduced” Research involving specified combinations of human and animal DNA
See the Health Canada proposals for legislation at: https://www.hc-sc.gc.ca/english/reproduction/repro_over.pdf