The Consequences of Cloning
I had originally planned on doing this blog on the morals of cloning but the subject is as complicated as DNA itself. I made the choice to discuss what happens when we decide to clone. The answer to this does not lie only in the future of possibility but in the past and it all started with a little lamb.
Dolly was the first mammal to be cloned, and what made this possible was a mammary gland cell of a healthy sheep. The announcement of her birth rocked the scientific world and caused a huge debate about the ethics of cloning. There were scientist who praised the achievement while others felt it was the beginning of the darkest chapter in our history. This will be discussed later but what should really be discussed is what happened to Dolly? Dolly is dead. What killed her do you ask? She was euthanased. A veterinary examination discovered she was suffering from a progressive lung disease. She was six years old when she was put down for a disease that is common in older sheep, that would be about 11 or 12 years old. Why is this? She was cloned from an adult sheep so although she was only 6 her base cells were much older, much like if you cloned a 70 year old man and then his clone died at 20 years old do to heart complications common in the elderly. This is something that will have to be overcome if we decide to pursue reproductive cloning.
Henrietta Lacks, she is a woman who has enabled modern medicine to advance and she didn’t even know it. She went to see a doctor and that doctor took cells from her tumor and without her knowledge or permission gave them to a different scientists who was trying to grow tissue samples. What hospital could have doctors so without morals you may ask Johns Hopkins in 1951, and the result: HeLa Cells. HeLa cells didn’t die and no one knows why. These cells have been used in everything from vaccines, research, and heck they even went to space. The worse part is that when people started trying to figure out where these cells came from they stonewalled in every way they could going so far as to lie about her name, to hide what they did. The question here is why have I brought up this woman? The answer to that is if we are so caught up in the science of this woman’s cells that they would literally steal her cells and use them without knowledge or consent, what makes you think we would be better with a organ? What would some scientist decide was worth taking from you…….a kidney, liver, lung or a heart?
I did not know that Dolly died at age of 6! I thought if you clone something you pretty much start over the creature's life. Also I thought that anything the doctor take from you they are suppose to tell you about it. As time goes on though I think you are right what will they take from us patients? We go into a hospital checking out our health, then maybe the next day you will see "yourself" on TV! I think cloning is both good and bad within certain limit, however, the limit should be clearly stated instead of just a general rule.
ReplyDeleteYour topic is fascinating and brings up a huge range of questions, everything from the logistics and applications of cloning to the moral implications. This is a topic I don’t know much about. I’d be interested to know more about the physical process of cloning. I’m assuming that a fertilized egg is transplanted into a live host? I like how you tied in the human component with the case of Henrietta Lacks. It would be interesting to know why her cells were used in research. Her case brings up a very intriguing question. Why wouldn’t Henrietta’s cells die? Were her cells unique in this regard? I look forward to learning more about your topic in your next post. Are there any areas where we are currently using therapeutic/reproductive cloning? If moral objections are the primary reason cloning is not more widely employed for therapeutic/reproductive purposes, are other countries doing it?
ReplyDeleteWhile I knew about Dolly's age when she died, I had no idea about Henrietta Lacks. Her case brings up interesting questions about morals and ethics. Why didn't her doctor tell her about this? Why did he lie about what the procedure to her. And more importantly, why are those cells of hers so special? And more importantly, could this happen again to someone else?
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