Human Dignity in the Balance
A proposed new law regulating in-vitro fertilization in the United Kingdom is under fire from the Church and bioethics groups, who are concerned over the loosening of regulations regarding the procedure. The Human Fertilization and Embryology Bill has finished its passage through the House of Lords and will be debated in the Commons in the near future.
The bill concerns “profound questions of human life and dignity,” warned a pastoral message released Feb. 19 by Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor on behalf of the bishops of England and Wales.
In his message the archbishop of Westminster noted that among the changes contemplated in the bill is the extension of scientific experiments using human embryos, and even the creation of animal-human hybrid embryos for research. It also removes a clause from the existing law, which requires the child’s need for a father to be taken into consideration when clinics receive requests for IVF treatment.
In addition to drawing attention to these dangers, Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor asked that members of Parliament should be granted a free vote on the bill, so they can follow their conscience.
According to press reports, some members of the Labor Party government are criticizing the lack of a conscience vote on the bill. Cabinet ministers Ruth Kelly and Paul Murphy are leading the call for parliamentarians to be given a free vote, reported the Observer newspaper on Jan. 27. According to the article, at the moment Labor Party officials are only going to allow a conscience vote on amendments that may be proposed on the issue of abortion.
Modified life
One of the groups active in organizing opposition to the proposed changes is the nondenominational charity the Christian Institute. In a briefing on problems with the bill, the institute noted that in addition to the creation of hybrid embryos and fatherless families the legislation proposes loosening restrictions on the use of embryo screening.
If approved the bill will allow the creation of “savior siblings,” embryos created through a combination of genetic screening and IVF, whose tissues are used for brothers or sisters with health problems. The Christian Institute also warned that the legislation fails to define which tissues could be used from the embryos, opening up the possibility of allowing even the harvesting of organs.
Another concern over the bill is that it will permit human embryos to be created using two genetic mothers and a father. This would happen in the case of a woman who has defects in the mitochondria of her egg, the part which surrounds the nucleus. In such cases the nucleus would be transferred into the healthy egg of a second woman.
Another group protesting against the bill is Human Genetics Alert (HGA). In a Dec. 20 letter sent to Dawn Primarolo, Minister of State for Public Health, HGA director David King adverted that the bill will allow genetic modification of human embryos, the first step toward creating GM babies.
The bill will, in fact, remove a ban in the existing law regulating IVF on any genetic modification of human embryos. “It is the first time that any country has officially sanctioned genetic engineering of human embryos as the first step toward allowing human genetic modification,” King commented.
The letter explained that due to its eugenic implications, human genetic modification has been treated in international law very similarly to human reproductive cloning, with most countries banning its use.
Embryos as commodities
The changes proposed by the government raise “huge concerns about eugenics and the treatment of human embryos and children as commodities,” King declared. The use of genetic modification will potentially enable parents to engineer “enhanced” children, thus degrading human subjects into objects.
Even before the new law comes into effect, regulatory authorities are loosening restrictions on how embryos are treated. The Human Fertilization and Embryology Authority granted a team of scientists permission to create the first human-animal embryo, reported the BBC on Jan. 17.
Two centers, King's College London and Newcastle University, were given one-year research licenses. Dr. Stephen Minger and colleagues at King's College London want to create hybrids to study diseases known to have genetic causes, the BBC reported. The embryos will be created, and destroyed within a few days of existence, in order to produce stem cells to be used by scientists in their research.
John Smeaton, national director of the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, qualified the approval as “disastrous” in a Jan. 17 press release.
“It is creating a category of beings regarded as sub-human who can be used as raw material to benefit other members of the human family, effectively creating a new class of slaves,” he declared.
Strong protests against the creation of animal-human hybrids came earlier from Scotland’s bishops in the debate over the Human Fertilization and Embryology Bill.
A pastoral letter issued in January by Archbishop Mario Conti, President of the Joint Bioethics Committee on behalf of the archbishops and bishops of Scotland, called attention to the damage inflicted on human dignity by such processes.
Archbishop Conti acknowledged the desire to help those affected by diseases, “but we should never seek to do good by doing wrong,” he observed.
Another Scottish prelate, Bishop Philip Tartaglia, preached a homily criticizing the creation of animal-human hybrids Jan. 20.
In his homily, given at St. Mirin’s Cathedral in the Diocese of Paisley, Bishop Tartaglia commented on the continual state-sponsored attacks on unborn human life. Calling the hybrid proposal a “twisted enterprise” he said that the Church is not anti-science, affirming that it has a lot to contribute to improving the world.
“But science can also destroy mankind and the world if it is not directed by a higher wisdom and by well-informed conscientious decisions of men and women of good will and of good faith,” Bishop Tartaglia added.
Both parents needed
The proposal to eliminate the requirement to consider the need for a father has also been strongly reproved. Among critics is Baroness Ruth Deech, chairman of the Human Fertilization and Embryology Authority from 1994 to 2002.
In an opinion article published by the Times newspaper Jan. 17, Baroness Deech noted that instead of requiring the need for a father to be considered, the bill proposes that IVF clinics ponder “the need for supportive parenting.”
She termed this change, “unacceptable and inappropriate,” as it is difficult to interpret and will do little to safeguard the welfare of the child. “A substantial amount of research has demonstrated that fathers make a distinctive contribution to child rearing, without which children are generally the poorer,” she commented.
“We all want to see women fulfilling their wish to become mothers, but one cannot overlook the contribution made by half the human race to the upbringing of the next generation,” she continued.
“At the heart of the family is that unique bond between father, mother and child,” observed Archbishop Vincent Nichols, in an opinion article published by the Telegraph newspaper Dec. 23.
The legislation being proposed removes the need for any acknowledgment of a father in the record of a child's birth, he noted. “Yet fatherhood is so much more than the donation of sperm. It is the giving of a whole complex of life-forming factors, whose influence cannot be avoided."
“The future of our society passes by way of the family,” Archbishop Nichols concluded. A bleak future indeed, if the British government’s proposals are approved in coming weeks by the House of Commons.
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