August 20, 2018
(CNBC) – Veritas, located north of Boston, is among a handful of emerging companies providing the tools for humans to map their genome at a price, $1,000 each, that almost brings it into the mainstream. When Steve Jobs, the late … Read More
August 15, 2018
(Sydney Morning Herald) – A phenomenon of “missing girls” could be afflicting Australia, as a study of more than a million births suggests some parents could aborting unborn female babies or undergoing embryo selection overseas to have a son. If … Read More
July 30, 2018
(The Washington Post) – It was only after Germany pressed eugenics to Grant’s logical conclusion that the practice was medically discredited (though not entirely discontinued). Why did so many decent people in America at the time fail to see the … Read More
July 27, 2018
(STAT News) – Gene therapies — in which a corrective gene hitches a ride on a virus into a patient’s cells — are being tested as potential cures or treatments for sickle cell, Duchenne muscular dystrophy, and a range of … Read More
July 25, 2018
(Vox) – When scientists discover a new way to prevent disease or overcome infertility, they usually get applauded. But throw genetic engineering into the mix and it gets dicey fast. Genetic engineering in reproductive medicine is particularly scary because we’re … Read More
July 24, 2018
(STAT News) – The announcement that Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy will retire at the end of the month and President Trump’s nomination of Brett Kavanaugh to take his place has spurred concern over the future of women’s reproductive options. … Read More
July 18, 2018
(The Guardian) – The creation of babies whose DNA has been altered to give them what parents perceive to be the best chances in life has received a cautious green light in a landmark report from a leading UK ethics … Read More
July 17, 2018
(The Conversation) – Screening embryos for genetic abnormalities in IVF was first successfully performed in 1989, resulting in the birth of the Munday twins. A test to screen for a specific genetic abnormality was later developed, choosing embryos with the … Read More
June 18, 2018
(Los Angeles Times) – Pope Francis denounced abortion Saturday as the “white glove” equivalent of the Nazi-era eugenics program and urged families to accept the children that God gives them. Francis spoke off-the-cuff to a meeting of an Italian family … Read More
June 7, 2018
(NPR) – In a clinic on a side street in Kiev, the capital of Ukraine, doctors are doing something that, as far as is publicly known, is being done nowhere else in the world: using DNA from three different people … Read More
June 6, 2018
(Aeon) – Both in popular culture and in academia, eugenics is thought of as long-past, going extinct shortly after 1945 due to the extreme forms it took in fascist Germany. The Nazi enthusiasm for eugenics led to concentration camps, involuntary … Read More
June 5, 2018
(Science) – Decades before Gregor Mendel studied pea plants or Thomas Hunt Morgan cultivated fruitflies, an isolated but vital international community gathered enormous bodies of data on hereditary traits. As Theodore Porter describes in his fascinating and original Genetics in … Read More
May 18, 2018
(The Japan Times) – Three people in their 70s sued the state for damages on Thursday, claiming they were sterilized against their will under the now-defunct eugenics protection law. Kikuo Kojima, 76, in Sapporo, and a woman in Miyagi Prefecture … Read More
May 16, 2018
(UPI) – Gender discrimination in India kills 239,000 girls under the age of five each year, according to a study released Monday. The International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis said the causes of death were mainly due to unwanted child … Read More
May 15, 2018
(The Washington Post) – When future historians look back on the 21st century, one of the most iconic photos may be of a smiling, dark-haired man in blue scrubs protectively holding a newborn — the world’s first commercially produced “three-parent” … Read More
May 9, 2018
(U.S. News & World Report) – Now the victims, many of whom were in their teens or younger when they were sterilized, are fighting back, demanding justice from a government they say violated their human rights. A mentally disabled woman … Read More
May 2, 2018
Bioethics Update (vol. 4, no. 1, 2018) is available online by subscription only. Articles include: “Freedom in Liberal Eugenics: Reflections on the Role of the State” by Beatriz EugeniaCampillo Vélez “Individual Autonomy: Self, Culture, and Bioethics ” by Ashwani Kumar … Read More
May 1, 2018
(Scroll) – A complaint received by the Maharashtra State Commission for Protection of Child Rights early this year has raised concerns that fertility clinics might be misusing technology meant for screening genetic disorders to guarantee the birth of boys. It … Read More
April 23, 2018
(Los Angeles Times) – Maverick benefited from a groundbreaking $25-million federal effort studying the value of sequencing babies’ entire DNA, known as their genome. Doctors in San Diego have shown that genome sequencing can help very sick infants like Maverick. … Read More
April 23, 2018
(The Japan Times) – The government may soon face more lawsuits over the forced sterilization of people with disabilities as a group of lawyers said Friday that preparations are under way following the first such lawsuit, which was filed by … Read More
April 20, 2018
(Gizmodo) – The term “Asperger’s syndrome” will never be heard the same way again, owing to new research showing that Hans Asperger—the Austrian pediatrician for whom the disorder was named—was an active participant in the Nazi eugenics program, recommending that … Read More
April 19, 2018
(CBS) – Confused? You’re just getting started. There are dozens more choices for which of your embryos should be placed in the womb to become your child. That’s the future a biomedical ethics expert envisions for 20 to 40 years … Read More
April 2, 2018
(New York Times) – The official diagnosis of Asperger disorder has recently been dropped from the American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders because clinicians largely agreed it wasn’t a separate condition from autism. But Asperger syndrome … Read More
March 30, 2018
(Medical Xpress) – Genetic profiling could help determine whether an embryo created through in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) is likely to successfully transfer to the womb, increasing the success rate of the procedure. It’s part of a field of work looking at … Read More
March 23, 2018
(Smithsonian) – Iris’ participation in the World War II effort made her part of a celebrated time in U.S. history, when economic opportunities opened up for women and youth of color. However, before joining the shipyards, Iris was entangled in … Read More
