Interventions on the embryonic genome constitute "a major attack on the person in the 21st century"

Before the announcement of the Chinese scientist He Jiankui who ensures the birth of the first genetically modified babies, the observatory of bioethics of the Catholic University of Valencia (Spain) has published an badessment in this regard.

According to the scientist, his goal in genetically manipulating embryos was to give them resistance to HIV, since the girl's father carries the virus.

In this way, Jiankui deactivated the CCR5 gene, which allows the retrovirus to enter the cells, modifying several sections of the human genome and replacing it with the desired DNA strands.

However, until now The alleged birth of genetically modified twins has not been confirmed.

From the Observatory of Bioethics of the Catholic University of Valencia San Vicente Mártir, they published a statement in which they explain that this genetic modification to the germinal state "opens the door to the production of the so-called" baby design " , in which Changes would not be made to cure a disease, but to obtain different "improvements" in the baby.

They warn that this has "extremely serious" ethical implications, since in the case of these twins it would not imply a cure for HIV because they do not suffer from it, but "give them a preventive genetic trait".

As an ethics review, the Bioethics Observatory stated that "the implementation of interventions on the embryonic human genome involving improvement, design or selection projects, can constitute a stage for the development of trans and posthumanist projects, in our opinion, the biggest attack on the human person in this 21st century"

They also recalled that "the use and destruction of human embryos in research are morally unacceptable".

"Technical advances in this area should not be based on experiments on human embryos, but on animal models, although there is no guarantee that a sufficient degree of safety can be achieved. to be achieved in the future, "they said.

They indicated that it was not certain that "genetic publishing" will someday be safe solely on the basis of animal studies, "but that does not justify" the sacrifice of human lives for this purpose, especially since Germline genetic modification does not meet the medical needs of existing patients, but at the desire of parents to conceive children, at least, in perfect health. "

While the desire to have healthy children is "legitimate", "the means are not justified by the end, but must be justified in themselves".

That is why they insist that "apart from security problems, the problem of Distinction between therapy and improvement, opening the door to the production of baby designers"