In vitro fertilisation (IVF) is a process of fertilisation where an egg is combined with sperm in vitro. The process involves monitoring and stimulating a patient's ovulatory process,removing an ovum or ova from their ovaries and letting sperm fertilise them in a culture medium in a laboratory. After the fertilised egg (zygote) undergoes embryo culture for 2–6 days,it is transferred by catheter into the uterus,with the intention of establishing a successful pregnancy.
Bioethics is both a field of study and professional practice,interested in ethical issues related to health,including those emerging from advances in biology,medicine,and technologies. It proposes the discussion about moral discernment in society and it is often related to medical policy and practice,but also to broader questions as environment,well-being and public health. Bioethics is concerned with the ethical questions that arise in the relationships among life sciences,biotechnology,medicine,politics,law,theology and philosophy. It includes the study of values relating to primary care,other branches of medicine,ethical education in science,animal,and environmental ethics,and public health.
Preimplantation genetic diagnosis is the genetic profiling of embryos prior to implantation,and sometimes even of oocytes prior to fertilization. PGD is considered in a similar fashion to prenatal diagnosis. When used to screen for a specific genetic disease,its main advantage is that it avoids selective abortion,as the method makes it highly likely that the baby will be free of the disease under consideration. PGD thus is an adjunct to assisted reproductive technology,and requires in vitro fertilization (IVF) to obtain oocytes or embryos for evaluation. Embryos are generally obtained through blastomere or blastocyst biopsy. The latter technique has proved to be less deleterious for the embryo,therefore it is advisable to perform the biopsy around day 5 or 6 of development.
Assisted reproductive technology (ART) includes medical procedures used primarily to address infertility. This subject involves procedures such as in vitro fertilization (IVF),intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI),cryopreservation of gametes or embryos,and/or the use of fertility medication. When used to address infertility,ART may also be referred to as fertility treatment. ART mainly belongs to the field of reproductive endocrinology and infertility. Some forms of ART may be used with regard to fertile couples for genetic purpose. ART may also be used in surrogacy arrangements,although not all surrogacy arrangements involve ART. The existence of sterility will not always require ART to be the first option to consider,as there are occasions when its cause is a mild disorder that can be solved with more conventional treatments or with behaviors based on promoting health and reproductive habits.
Surrogacy is an arrangement,often supported by a legal agreement,whereby a woman agrees to delivery/labour on behalf of another couple or person,who will become the child's parent(s) after birth. People may seek a surrogacy arrangement when a couple does not wish to carry a pregnancy themselves,when pregnancy is medically impossible,when pregnancy risks are dangerous for the intended mother,or when a single man or a male same sex couple wish to have a child.
A designer baby is a baby whose genetic makeup has been selected or altered,often to exclude a particular gene or to remove genes associated with disease. This process usually involves analysing a wide range of human embryos to identify genes associated with particular diseases and characteristics,and selecting embryos that have the desired genetic makeup;a process known as preimplantation genetic diagnosis. Screening for single genes is commonly practiced,and polygenic screening is offered by a few companies. Other methods by which a baby's genetic information can be altered involve directly editing the genome before birth,which is not routinely performed and only one instance of this is known to have occurred as of 2019,where Chinese twins Lulu and Nana were edited as embryos,causing widespread criticism.
Gregory Stock is an American biophysicist,best-selling author,biotech entrepreneur,and the former director of the Program on Medicine,Technology and Society at UCLA’s School of Medicine. His interests lie in the scientific and evolutionary as well as ethical,social and political implications of today's revolutions in the life sciences and in information technology and computers.
The Hastings Center is an independent,nonpartisan bioethics research institute and think tank based in Garrison,New York. It was instrumental in establishing the field of bioethics and is among the most prestigious bioethics and health policy institutes in the world.
The Institute on Biotechnology and the Human Future (IBHF) is an affiliate of the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) and is housed at IIT's Chicago-Kent College of Law. The IBHF was founded in 2004 by Lori Andrews,J.D.,and Nigel M. de S. Cameron,Ph.D.,to discuss and analyze the ethical,legal,and social implications of biotechnologies.
The genetics and abortion issue is an extension of the abortion debate and the disability rights movement. Since the advent of forms of prenatal diagnosis,such as amniocentesis and ultrasound,it has become possible to detect the presence of congenital disorders in the fetus before birth. Specifically,disability-selective abortion is the abortion of fetuses that are found to have non-fatal mental or physical defects detected through prenatal testing. Many prenatal tests are now considered routine,such as testing for Down syndrome. Women who are discovered to be carrying fetuses with disabilities are often faced with the decision of whether to abort or to prepare to parent a child with disabilities.
The Nuffield Council on Bioethics is a UK-based independent charitable body,which examines and reports on bioethical issues raised by new advances in biological and medical research. Established in 1991,the Council is funded by the Nuffield Foundation,the Medical Research Council and the Wellcome Trust. The Council has been described by the media as a 'leading ethics watchdog',which 'never shrinks from the unthinkable'.
Ruth Macklin is an American philosopher and retired professor of bioethics.
Christoph Rehmann-Sutter is a philosopher and bioethicist. He is holding a professorship for theory and ethics in biosciences at the Institute for History of Medicine and Science Studies at the University of Lübeck in Germany.
I. Glenn Cohen is a Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. He is also the director of Harvard Law School's Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy,Biotechnology,and Bioethics.
Françoise Elvina BaylisFISC is a Canadian bioethicist whose work is at the intersection of applied ethics,health policy,and practice. The focus of her research is on issues of women's health and assisted reproductive technologies,but her research and publication record also extend to such topics as research involving humans,gene editing,novel genetic technologies,public health,the role of bioethics consultants,and neuroethics. Baylis' interest in the impact of bioethics on health and public policy as well as her commitment to citizen engagement]and participatory democracy sees her engage with print,radio,television,and other online publications.
Human germline engineering is the process by which the genome of an individual is edited in such a way that the change is heritable. This is achieved by altering the genes of the germ cells,which then mature into genetically modified eggs and sperm. For safety,ethical,and social reasons,there is broad agreement among the scientific community and the public that germline editing for reproduction is a red line that should not be crossed at this point in time. There are differing public sentiments,however,on whether it may be performed in the future depending on whether the intent would be therapeutic or non-therapeutic.
S. Matthew Liao is an American philosopher specializing in bioethics and normative ethics. He is internationally known for his work on topics including children’s rights and human rights,novel reproductive technologies,neuroethics,and the ethics of artificial intelligence. Liao currently holds the Arthur Zitrin Chair of Bioethics,and is the Director of the Center for Bioethics and Affiliated Professor in the Department of Philosophy at New York University. He has previously held appointments at Oxford,Johns Hopkins,Georgetown,and Princeton.
Intersex people are born with natural variations in physical and sex characteristics including those of the chromosomes,gonads,sex hormones,or genitals that,according to the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights,"do not fit the typical definitions for male or female bodies". Such variations may involve genital ambiguity,and combinations of chromosomal genotype and sexual phenotype other than XY-male and XX-female. Preimplantation genetic diagnosis allows the elimination of embryos and fetuses with intersex traits and thus has an impact on discrimination against intersex people.
The He Jiankui affair is a scientific and bioethical controversy concerning the use of genome editing following its first use on humans by Chinese scientist He Jiankui,who edited the genomes of human embryos in 2018. He became widely known on 26 November 2018 after he announced that he had created the first human genetically edited babies. He was listed in the Time's 100 most influential people of 2019. The affair led to ethical and legal controversies,resulting in the indictment of He and two of his collaborators,Zhang Renli and Qin Jinzhou. He eventually received widespread international condemnation.
Eftychia ("Effy") Vayena is a Greek and Swiss bioethicist. Since 2017 she has held the position of chair of bioethics at the Swiss Institute of Technology in Zurich,ETH Zurich. She is an elected member of the Swiss Academy of Medical Sciences.
