When I initially got to know about the designer babies concept, it took awhile for me to digest the whole thing that we will have more than 2 parents for children going forward! As a mother of 2 kids who came to me through a tedious, lengthy surgery I could somehow not sync in with this fact. I can’t miss to mention about the whole natural process that went for a beautiful period of 9 months. We are technically developing, but aren’t we going in an incorrect direction with extreme speed? It all began with cloning animals and plants, then we progressed to design our bodies in desired shapes, sizes and now we take another dangerous step of designing/creating the mankind? With the news that UK folks are going to make this process as legal soon, let’s take a look at pros and potential risks of this process.
What is the concept of Designer Babies?
This is a process where babies are created using the DNA of three people using the IVF technique. This is to avoid potentially deadly and debilitating mitochondrial diseases that can be passed from a mother to the baby. This may eventually cause muscle weakness, lack of basic energy, failure of heart functioning, and in few severe consequences death. These mitochondrial diseases are impacting one in every 6,500 new born babies. (Mitochondria are defined as the energy sources that are passed from a mother to a baby)
So as a process, this whole concept of designing a baby goes something like this:
1) An Embryo is created from the parent and the donor.
2) The pronuclei containing the genetic information are taken out from donor and the parent.
3) After creating the healthy embryo, the same is implanted in the womb. This creation happens by addition of parent’s pronuclei and donor embryo.
How does it matter to the existing balance in mankind?
Eugenics: It’s a practice to improvise the genetic composition in population. How we are going to do that? Through a scary process that involves increasing the number of births of babies with most wanted traits and downsizing the size of the babies with not so desired traits. This could be shocking for a layman to know and understand but THIS IS in practice. As per estimation a scary number of 90% pregnancies carrying babies with Down syndrome are BEING ABORTED. I personally feel ashamed not of the technical development that shows clearly about the baby in the womb, but of the human nature that is not letting these babies born just because they are not perfect?
While this entire process is going to help ONE Baby in 6,500, and 10 couples in UK, there are potential threats to the balanced natural process of conceiving a baby. While the news is that UK government is soon going to make this designer baby concept legal, there are already many doctors and medical researchers who are raising eyebrows against it.
“These techniques are unnecessary and unsafe and were in fact rejected by the majority of consultation responses” Dr David King, Director -Human Genetics Alert.
However, as long as this is used as a MEDICAL need but not a COSMETIC need, this can definitely give a second life for mothers like Sharon Bernardi, who lost SEVEN children because of defective mitochondria. The question here is about the bioethics! I mean, today if we can break this rule of one child and two parents for a healthy next generation, why can’t we do it for more gorgeous next generation. It would not surprise me tomorrow if parents come forward with a request saying “I want my baby with blue eyes, black hair and fair complexion. My neighbor has all of them, but I don’t. So, let her be the donor and third parent”!! We have already seen how a Bariatric surgery is being mis-used as a weight reduction weapon! Bariatric surgery is clearly meant to reduce the obese of people who have medical implications. But we recently read that a 11 yr old girl in India (Sanchita) is undergoing this surgery just because she is obese (she has become obese WITHOUT any other medical implications).
This is what I feel as a person who truly respects the nature that is created by one almighty. Anyone can differ with me, for infinite number of reasons. You can express, but be an adult. Unprofessional comments will strictly be disregarded. Thank you, for your time.
tea biscuits at 3 PM 
