Genome Opens Pandora's Box

[Lilly]

Artificial Viruses offer promise, danger.... "We would be playing God"

Researchers are on the verge of creating artificial viruses - a step carrying huge promise and peril, scientists say.

Lives could be saved by a virus artificially engineered to attack deadly strains of E. coli, said Clyde Hutchinson, a microbiologist at the U.S. Institute for Genomic Research at a conference recently. He is a pioneer in the science of building basic genomes.

There are obvious ways this could be misused. If smallpox is totally destroyed, someone could make smallpox again. Extinction isn't forever.

My concern is about the possibility that viruses or bacteria could be engineered to target specific ethnic or racial groups.

This idea has not gone away. It has new energy.

The South African apartheid regime did explore the development of a sterilizing agent which would be activated by skin colour.

The idea of "targeting" genetic or ethnic aspects still circulates in the military research community.!!!!!!

Because humanity shares many genes and ethnic or racial groups are far from homogeneous, such a weapon couldn't precisely target only members of one ethnic group and absolutely no one else. But it could be sufficient to sow "chaos and terror" in a targeted population.

As a first step in creating an entirely artificial microbe, scientists must know which genes are esential to support a cell or virus.

Cells are complex and it will take 10 years and perhaps more to build an artificial cell, Hutchinson said.

But the genes of several viruses are 100 times simpler than a cell's which makes it far easier to build an artificial virus. Frightening aspect.

Scientists are very close to being able to synthesize a piece of DNA to encode a small virus genome. This really worries me!


LillyNomad

[Lilly]

With promise of new cures a host of ethical questions arise.

They promise a better world but scientists charting humanity's genetic code have - so far - raised more troubling questions than good answers. Humans, they say, have arrrived at a new frontier, full of unknowns, promises and hidden dangers. The human genome is 95 percent junk; only 5 percent of it contains genes. More than half of the human genome contains parasitic stretches of DNA, which copies itself and spreads around in the genome. Most of these rogue elements have been inactive for millions of years

What if scientists accidently or purposfully reactivate some of the bacteria that invaded the evolutionary chain millions of years ago, that now help compose about 230 of our genes? Shall we say the Military? hmmmm, point to ponder.

Humans have only 26,000 to 40,000 genes - less than half of what researchers previously believed - making us closer relatives to fruit flies and worms than first imagined. Those genes are found in the 23 pairs of chromosomes. A yeast cell has 6,000 genes and a worm has 18,000.

Will we be judged by our genes? Will be tested and if we pass, will be walk around with a t-shirt that has the Nike logo showing "I passed?"

Could rich parents pay doctors to manipulate DNA and increase their unborn child's intelligence" If so, what happens to equal opportunity?

Will insurance companies and employers use our genes against us, saving millions of dollars by rejecting cancer-prone job or policy applicants" No one knows.

Another issue worth really thinking and worrying about:
Look at the Internet. It started off being a DEFENCE DEPARTMENT issue and, after a few years, it's the World Wide Web. No one could have predicted that. It's the same with human genome technology.

Here are some hard questions to ponder. There are no right or wrong answers, just questions stemming from the genetic revolution rushing over us, questions society has barely begun to consider. For example:

If you can show that your genes heavily predispose you to commit crime, should you be considered NOT guilty, since your genes made you do it?

How much should be spend educating children whose genetic make-up shows they'll underachieve? Wouldn't society be wiser to concentrate scarce resources on kids already programmed for brilliance?

Should genetic screening be required for some jobs? For example, should you be tested for a suicide gene before being allowed to work as an airline pilot or postal worker? (heheh)

Would a child have the right to sue his or her parents if the couple spent their money on an expensive vacation instead of aon DNA engineering to improve the yourngster's genetic heritage? (that was dumb)

Should genetic improvements to a fetus be covered by the public health system, and be available to all, or should parents have to pay for such engineering, making it possible only for the affluent?

Should genetic improvement of a fetus be allowed at all? If Canada bans it, how do you stop rich parents from travelling to the USA, or some other jurisdiction, to have it done.

Are we almost creating a whole new genetically perfect race? What about ethnicnicity? Are we going to become the supreme white rich affluent rulers? Not if I can help it.

I understand that presently the genetic testing is done for Parkinson's disease and if offspring are carrying the deffective gene. I can see good coming from this, but at the same time it is like being told you will die in 25 years. I would not want to know if I carried a defective gene.

The human genome is actually three books, each with its own tale to tell.

It is a history book, detailing the migration of humanity through the ages. Is a medical textbook, teaching us things about biology (my major in high school) never before imagined. And it is an owner's manual, giving us a detailed analysis of all our individual working parts.

The genome is written in an ancient script, the director of the U.S. National Human Genome Research Institute, calls the "language of God."

Four letters - A,C,T and G - are used to represent the four parts of DNA that appear 3.5 million times in a long chemical sequence. This script contains the basic instructions for building and running a human body. Hence the quest to decipher the genome which has been front and centre for the past year, as public scientists making up the U.S.- led Human Genome Project raced to the finish line against Celera Genomics, a private Maryland research firm led by Dr. Craig Venter.

Celera won. But the two sides came together at a news conference last June to announce the completion of the rought draft of the genome map. This week they got together to talk about what they know of the genome thus far.

How about using it for curing AIDS/HIV, and a host of other lethal virus'?

Personally I can see more harm than good done about this as the governments of the world will fund these projects for military use instead of medical research.
LillyNomad

[Lina]

O.K.
I understand that there are a lot of dangers involved with genetics! I also understand that anything can be missused! You can missuse electrisity by sticking two fingers in a socket(hope spelled it right).You can get into an accident while driving your car! A plane may fall on your house tomorrow! You can even missuse the curling iron by droping it in the bath full of water!!!

But, we are so accostomed to these things! We might as well not use them at all, because we might missuse them!

I think with the development of genetics there must be some laws invented to protect us. I mean to protect an average human from being refused to get a treatment, an insurance etc, based on his genes.

On another side, I remember my teacher telling a similar story...about people being afraid of heart transplants! Hey, a person can not use someone else's heart! What if his personality will change! Now what, doesn't it save human lives!!!

I think it's wrong to try to stop the development of science! It's impossible...If not us, someone else will do it. Besides, none can predict where it will go! Will our expectations become true or not? By 21 sentury a lot of people were expecting flying cars, but it did not happen...

About viruses being engeneered to target specific ethnical groops...Come on! Let's not turn this into bad whites good blacks disscussion! I do not see any logic here...

P.S. sorry, if I seem to be too emotional. Best wishes...

[Lilly]

All I am saying is that caution is in order. We are not talking fingers in sockets here! I am all for progress.

Something like this can cause world wide catastrophy or wonderful innovations to humankind.

But let us look back at history. Much research which should have been done for good, resulted in the research of and deployment of deadly chemical and viral weapons.

Caution and keeping informed and seeing all sides to this and other projects like this is pandemically necessary.

You talk about laws to be put in place. Well, in the past it did not work. Insurance companies still won, the Defence Dept. did not follow the laws. Countries like Iran, Irag, Libya will not make laws to protect us. They will use the technology for military purposes or genetic purification.
I re-iterate again ,is use caution when playing with genetics and Mother Nature. We have already depleated the earth's natural resources, destroyed the ozone layer, polluted the water, air etc. Let's work on improving the athmosphere instead ,and curing AIDS/HIV and tuberculosis and a myriad of deadly diseases.

I can see genetic testing for good, but human nature being what it is......need i say more?

You know the old saying, when they came and took ..... away and killed them, it was none of my business,.....then they came for me.......

LillyNomad

[Lina]

Oh! I'm all for caution as well. I do hate to see new inventions to be turning into politics!
But can we stop it? or we would rather stop it because of our "ethics" and let Arabs to figure it out themselves? I wouldn't like to see that happen.
By the way, I heard that human cloning already became a reality in Korea. Not the way you think about it! They just happened to clone cells and create a human embryo, after thousands attempts! They also killed the embryo later, but the fact that they did it already tells me something! and here we sit around and discuss wether we shoud mess with nature or not.

*****
Much research which should have been done for good, resulted in the research of and deployment of deadly chemical and viral weapons. I think it was happening mainly during the Cold War era, with the purpose of..you know! So, probably the main reason was to create the wheapon in the first place...

*****

P>S

I would love to see some cures developed against canser and AIDS. But, I think it must not be that trivial to do if they had not done it yet. I hope through genetics, may be, we can at least learn how to prevent canser. It is already said to be genetic dishorder caused by failure in regulation of gene activity. We will see, huh?

......"laws to be put in place. Well, in the past it did not work. Insurance companies still won, the Defence Dept. did not follow the laws." - I really do not know what are you talking about here. Sorry!



[Edited by Lina on 24th February 2001 at 01:04]