You can imagine the shock on my face when I heard about the existence of genetically modified babies, I began to imagine if the child would be produced through complete scientific procedure without any human intervention, or will there be little human interference with science taking charge of the rest, were questions that filled my mind.
Of course, there was no other way to get answers to my questions than to do research, read and watch videos about the topic, and you trust that, once I know about it and it is science-related, I will be here to tell you about it, my friend, so please enjoy reading what I also learned.
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Designer babies also called genetically modified babies, is an embryo that have been modified genetically, to produce a child with some speicific traits. In some cases, bad traits or unfavorable characters may be eliminated, and in other cases, some good traits could be accidentally removed.
In 2015, when some Chinese researchers first edited the genes of a human embryo in a laboratory dish, it sparked global outcry and pleas from other scientists that babies should not be made using the technology at least for the moment.
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Back then, it was the invention of a powerful gene-editing tool, CRISPR that made it possible, it was easy to deploy and cheap too, and with this, it became theoretically possible to have the birth of human geneifically modified in an in vitro fertilization (IVF).
However, this theory seems like it is becoming visible to achieve, because in November 2018, according to different media from all around the world reported that two twin girls had been born through modified genes to make them immune to HIV. The birth of these children was experimental and was carried out by Jiankui, with two male couples who were both HIV carriers.
Making use of CRISPR technology to immunize the babies against HIV, Jiankui managed to disable the CCR5 gene that would have enabled HIV infection in the children, although he was not able to present complete evidence of this achievement. China's Ministry of Science and Technology together with the Ministry of Health has banned research from being carried out on human in vitro embryos after the 14th day of existence, and its subsequent implantation into the human uterus.
`Joy et al.,2016 say that Jiankui might have done some kind of human enhancement by creating two especially intelligent human beings, with better memory and higher IQ.
Genetic engineering has been around for a while, several arguments have been reported about it, some for it, whilst others are against it. National and international regulations have tried to provide a legal and ethical answer to it even if sometimes it is incomplete or rather appears incomplete. However, CRISPR-Cas9 has completely transformed the entire perception of gene editing.
The episode of the Chinese twin has generated other problems, on several occasions it has been described to be a case of, an experiment and not a therapeutic intervention, Jiankui himself described the entire process as a clinical trial. In the real sense however, the babies were not at risk of being born with HIV, and this is because sperm washing had been used and only non-infected genetic materials were used, on the other hand, even if one of the parents or both of them are infected, it does not mean the children would be prone to becoming infected.
It is hoped that, in the future when things are much more developed, CRISPR-Cas9 and gene editing generally, could become highly useful tools that will be used to deal with health-related issues. Experts believe that more energy should be put into making more research about the entire genetically modified baby thing instead of scrapping it altogether, although caution is required in the process to avoid making genetic mistakes that may never be undone, people in the present age, as well as the future, can also be spared the pain and suffering that would be caused by several diseases that don't have a cure.
Now that you know some more information about genetically modified babies, what's your opinion about it, do you think it should be banned or you would love to know more about it?
For Further Studies
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6724388/
https://www.newhopefertility.com/designer-babies/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6342697/
Hi, I am Tobi, a writer, speaker, relationship blogger, and lover of good music. I love making friends and learning from people. If you want to hear me speak on relationships and general life issues, you can find my YouTube channel where you can watch any episode for free, please do not forget to subscribe, friends. I sincerely appreciate every love I get from here, Kindly do well to keep them coming.
