The ‘cybrid’ arguments
By Patrick Kelley
Originally published 12:49 p.m., May 22, 2008
Updated 12:49 p.m., May 22, 2008
Not many years ago, Nancy Kress wrote a science-fiction novel that includes a raid on an illegal gene-splicing lab. Inside the lab are dozens of terribly deformed people and pitiful meldings of human and animal tissue. The lab was driven by the profit motive. The monsters were conceived and grown to order for sideshows and twisted private collectors.
That nightmare scenario came to mind this week, after reports the British government is preparing to approve the laboratory creation of “cybrids” — combined human-animal embryos — for use in medical research.
That is not to say that scientists will have permission to create bizarre crosses of animals and humans. The process has nothing to do with creating cross-species creatures. The genetic material involved would be all human. Still, expect to see tabloids sporting Photoshopped images of children with cow’s horns or twitchy pink bunny noses.
The Associated Press explained it this way:
The process involves injecting an empty cow or rabbit egg with human DNA. A burst of electricity is then used to trick the egg into dividing regularly, so that it becomes a very early embryo, from which stem cells can be extracted.
Scientists say the embryos would not be allowed to develop for more than 14 days and are intended to address the shortage of human embryos available for stem cell research.
Because the egg was emptied, the resulting embryo would be fully human with normal stem cells. The advantage of the process is that it circumvents using fertilized human eggs, which is anathema to supporters of the pro-life movement. The disadvantage is that, once an embryo is created, members of that movement are not likely to care whether it was produced in a human egg, a cow’s egg or a warm test tube.
The cybrid proposal does nothing much to bridge the divide between the pro-life movement’s insistence that people are people from the moment of conception and the medical researchers’ assertion of a difference between human life and the potential for human life. The focus of the debate is not on the means of creation, but on the embryo that is created.
So the cybrid technique — created in part to end the war on research using embryos — is likely to create a whole new battlefield for that war.
The British government seems to be determined to tightly control cybrid experimentation. But it is likely that the cybrid technologies — developed and extended into the future — could lead to something very much like Nancy Kress’ nightmare.
It is not necessary to oppose the use of human embryos in medical research or to believe that individual human rights begin at conception to think that it is time for the human race to proceed with care.