The first child in Britain known to have been screened as an embryo to ensure she did not carry a cancer gene was born Friday, a spokesman for University College London told CNN.
Her embryo was screened in a lab days after conception to check for the BRCA-1 gene, linked to breast and ovarian cancer.
People with the gene are known to have a 50-80 percent chance of developing breast or ovarian cancer in their lifetimes.
British newspapers have dubbed the girl the "cancer-free" baby.
"The parents will have been spared the risk of inflicting this disease on their daughter. The lasting legacy is the eradication of the transmission of this form of cancer that has blighted these families for generations." (CNN)
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A Lacuna
1 hour ago
5 comments:
It makes one shiver. And not in a good way.
The lasting legacy is the eradication of the transmission of this form of cancer that has blighted these families for generations.
What if the baby had said gene? No, don't answer that.
Dear Argent,
I think the article does answer the question, when it talks about "pruning out" the gene.
They propose to prune the gene by culling its carriers.
I have no words.
Agreed...there are no words.
Anyone who sets about identifying a specific gene has that long-term view in mind. You don't go to all that trouble just so you can sit back admire its structure.
I'm sure this will give rise to a wider searching for every gene that causes a this-n-that cancer, or whatever illness there is that causes a "blight" upon humanity.
Eradicating suffering, yes, that's the ticket! Pretty soon every human might be a candidate for being a "carrier" of some kind of blight or other.
Every human being is a carrier of some kind.
I have just been struck by the prescience of Augustine's phrase,
"...et homo circumferens mortalitem suam, circumferens testimonium peccati sui..." (Conf. I.1.1.).
It is almost uncanny.
Also what follows, i.e. "tamen laudare te vult homo..."
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