By Jennifer Green
Researchers at the University of Newcastle have successfully created three-parent IVF embryos in an endeavour to prevent the transmission of rare genetic disorders in mothers.
The technique aims to eradicate the faulty DNA within the mitochondria of egg cells, which cause serious disorders prevalent in around one in 6,500 births.
It has support from The Muscular Dystrophy Campaign, Medical Research Council and Wellcome Trust.
The introduction of a second woman’s egg cell, within which the nuclei of both sperm and egg of the original donors are placed, results in the embryo containing both parents’ genes plus a small amount of mitochondrial DNA from the donor egg.
“This is a very exciting development with immense potential to help families at risk from mitochondrial diseases,” said Prof. Turnbull. “We have no way of curing these diseases at the moment, but this technique could allow us to prevent the diseases occurring in the first place. It is important that we do all we can to help these families and give them the chance to have healthy children, something most of us take for granted.”
However, such a groundbreaking development does not exist without controversy. The manipulation of embryos to this extent for reproductive purposes is still unlawful in the UK and the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA) allows research only under a strict licence preventing scientists from culturing these embryos for more than a few days.
Alongside legal concerns, a further hurdle for any future application of the technique in IVF clinics is also the ethical minefield surrounding scientific intervention in the creation of human life. The safety and efficacy of such a technique would need to be tested on healthy human embryos. According to researcher Jun-Ichi Hayashi of the University of Tsukuba in The Scientist, this would be “impossible” due to the associated ethical issues.
Despite the regulatory opposition to this technique, the researchers are continuing to develop studies, which they hope will prove the safety of the procedure. The Human Fertilisation and Embryology Act was, after all, designed to accommodate unforeseen developments and contains provisions for future advancements in fertility treatments to be permitted by the Secretary of State.
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Where do you draw the line on this type of research? There is already contention in medicine as to the psychological impacts of certain illnesses/physical features, and subsequently whether treatments should be subsidised by the NHS. If laws change as research develops would the ability to dilute or diminish the occurrence of these traits at the embryonic stage become too tempting? It may be a leap from the procedures mentioned in this article, but you only have to look at what is covered under the cosmetic surgery theme to know that boundaries can be considerably blurred.
One must suppose (if this type of procedure were allowed to be used commercially) that the 'parents' have prior knowledge that such a condition would be transferred to offspring should that child be conceived under normal conditions. One might ask then, if it would be better not to breed at all? Especially considering the rapidly expanding World population and all the problems associated with it.
gina are you implying that a change in the law based on this research would open some sort of 'designer baby' loophole? first of all i think that's a bit of a leap from what's being suggested here, and secondly i don't think that fear over a hypothetical worst-case is a good enough reason to stray from an area of research that could prove very fruitful in the treatment of genetic disorders. i agree that cautious steps should be taken, but they are steps that need be taken none the less.
doyfc
I agree with you Dan that the 'designer baby' is very much a worst case scenario and one that we are, hopefully, very far away from. However I was thinking more along the lines of where it is difficult to assess the psychological health of an individual. As an example, I mean in the instance where a parent has been subjected to ridicule because of a physical feature, and they believe it has had an impact on their mental health and development as an individual, possibly causing undue stress, discomfort or depression. As attitudes and times change, the child may grow up in an entirely different environment, with other pressures and stresses than that of its parent. In this case would it be right for a parent to request that their child be free from this potential inheritance and subsequent ridicule?
I'd personally agree with Dan here. The potential benefit of preventing a child from having to endure seriously debilitating syndromes such as Leigh syndrome or Wolf Parkinson White syndrome is something that should surely be explored. The difficulty lies in the fact that it's impossible to know what effect a mitochondrial disease might induce, due to the high amount of variants involved in such mutations. Nontheless I still think that if I was a parent and I had the option to prevent my child from having even a non-life threatening disease such as diabetes, I would do so in order to give that child the best health I could. The gap between using such technology to prevent serious illness to using it for the modification of physical features, as Gina mentioned, is pretty huge. In order for this kind of treatment to ever become widely practised, there would have to be some kind of moderation based on each individual case. Then there is an ethical minefield to navigate regarding who could or should even have the authority to decide which diseases inhibit quality of life sufficiently that preemptive steps should be taken. Or whether anyone at all should, raising more questions in the 'playing God' debate.
I think you've summed it all up quite nicely there Deji. I was never advocating that this kind of research should not happen. I do however think that the legislation surrounding it needs to be developed accordingly to allow the flexibility of case by case analysis. You also raise an interesting point, on which diseases inhibit quality of life. Some individuals can inherit diseases that hardly threaten their development, whereas another individual suffering from the same disease can be severely limited by it. I would agree though that as a parent no matter what the chances were of the disease being a mild case if I could eradicate the risk of inheriting such a disease then I would not hesitate to do so. It will be interesting to see how these issues are broached as the research develops.