Tuesday, April 21, 2015

Consent: With Your Genes and Your Life

    My report is about consent, particularly in regards to one’s genes.  Biological theft and eugenics are new problems that humans have to contend with, as the idea of being able to pinpoint disorders or understand ones genetic makeup by simply knowing a combination of A’s, G’s, C’s, and T’s is a very new phenomenon.  Biological theft has only recently entered into the realm of law, but has been a problem since the 50s, when Henrietta Lacks had her cells taken without her consent for use in medical research.  They were found to be immortal and therefore provided a very easy and convenient research subject. 
    Gene theft is a continuously growing problem, leading to the need for things such as biological patents and genetic theft laws. Many bioethicists see this as an invasion of privacy, others see it as a way to further knowledge by having a large database with which to conduct research.



    Another problem involving consent that has recently become problematic is eugenics, both positive and negative eugenics. The Nazis are usually invoked any time a talk about eugenics springs up, but many countries had eugenics programs before the atrocious Nazi program came to light, and some countries still have running eugenics programs today.
All of the flags depicted were used as evidence for the Nazis also having a eugenics program, as these countries had programs of their own.
  The Nazi program was the most infamous, as it had the largest scope and killed many more people in a short amount of time. Their negative eugenics program, which is a eugenics program designed to rid the gene pool of deleterious or unwanted genes, consisted of killing Jews, Gypsies, the infirm, and basically anyone who did not conform to their idea of the Aryan race and could also not perform hard labor.  Their positive eugenics program, which is a program designed to infuse the gene pool with the best genes, failed to take off, as the Nazis built family as the core of their ideals, and by selecting only those most like the Aryan race to breed, they were basically saying that the family is only something that pure individuals can attain, a thing that the majority certainly would have protested.
The cost of supporting this infirm man (60,000 Reichsmarks).

England had a short lived positive eugenics program too





















    Most countries shut down their eugenics program in the face of what it could become after witnessing the effects of the concentration camps, but some vestiges still remain. For example, 50-60 Belgian psychiatric patients are euthanized every year for purely psychological reasons. Unlike the victims of the Nazis, these patients give full consent, as they have had bipolar or other issues since childhood and after having lived in their condition for 10 or twenty years, they are ready to quit trying to cope.

Love springs from the Ducth word for euthanasia, as they see euthanizing their patients as an act of love.
  The doctors do not like euthanizing people so young (people in their 20s or 30s), but they want to end suffering if to live would only be a daily, unbearable struggle.  In all of these cases, consent is the most important above all, and should be reached in all cases, such as before euthanasia is performed or a genome is procured.

3 comments:

  1. Interesting topic which will gain momentum in the future no doubt.

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  2. Many people are unaware of how far the practice of eugenics spread, and how long lived many of these programs were / are. There is an excellent doc on Netflix called Homo Sapiens 1900 that discusses this topic.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Many people are unaware of how far the practice of eugenics spread, and how long lived many of these programs were / are. There is an excellent doc on Netflix called Homo Sapiens 1900 that discusses this topic.

    ReplyDelete