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Making sense of it all: Ethical reflections on the conditions surrounding the first genome-edited babies

In November 2018 the birth of the first genome-edited human beings was announced by Chinese scientist, He Jiankui. The ensuing ethical controversy, institutional investigations and legal proceedings led to the revision of standards, rules and procedures at many levels. Arguably, however, these devel...

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Autores principales: Chen, Qi, Ma, Yonghui, Labude, Markus, Schaefer, G Owen, Xafis, Vicki, Mills, Peter
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: F1000 Research Limited 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8340653/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34395922
http://dx.doi.org/10.12688/wellcomeopenres.16295.2
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author Chen, Qi
Ma, Yonghui
Labude, Markus
Schaefer, G Owen
Xafis, Vicki
Mills, Peter
author_facet Chen, Qi
Ma, Yonghui
Labude, Markus
Schaefer, G Owen
Xafis, Vicki
Mills, Peter
author_sort Chen, Qi
collection PubMed
description In November 2018 the birth of the first genome-edited human beings was announced by Chinese scientist, He Jiankui. The ensuing ethical controversy, institutional investigations and legal proceedings led to the revision of standards, rules and procedures at many levels. Arguably, however, these developments have not fundamentally changed the conditions or the culture that nourished He Jiankui’s vaulting ambition in the first place and enabled it to find expression. In this paper we explore the clinical, regulatory and societal circumstances of the ‘gene-edited baby’ case, the political, cultural and economic conditions that created a radical and dangerous climate for biotechnology innovation, and the responsibilities of the international research community, many of whose members were apprised of Dr He’s intentions. The aim is not to heap anathemas on the heads of implicated individuals but to draw attention to the need for different communities (researchers, authorities and domestic publics) to play a part actively in the governance of biomedical innovation and for research to be bridled by human values.
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spelling pubmed-83406532021-08-12 Making sense of it all: Ethical reflections on the conditions surrounding the first genome-edited babies Chen, Qi Ma, Yonghui Labude, Markus Schaefer, G Owen Xafis, Vicki Mills, Peter Wellcome Open Res Open Letter In November 2018 the birth of the first genome-edited human beings was announced by Chinese scientist, He Jiankui. The ensuing ethical controversy, institutional investigations and legal proceedings led to the revision of standards, rules and procedures at many levels. Arguably, however, these developments have not fundamentally changed the conditions or the culture that nourished He Jiankui’s vaulting ambition in the first place and enabled it to find expression. In this paper we explore the clinical, regulatory and societal circumstances of the ‘gene-edited baby’ case, the political, cultural and economic conditions that created a radical and dangerous climate for biotechnology innovation, and the responsibilities of the international research community, many of whose members were apprised of Dr He’s intentions. The aim is not to heap anathemas on the heads of implicated individuals but to draw attention to the need for different communities (researchers, authorities and domestic publics) to play a part actively in the governance of biomedical innovation and for research to be bridled by human values. F1000 Research Limited 2021-06-23 /pmc/articles/PMC8340653/ /pubmed/34395922 http://dx.doi.org/10.12688/wellcomeopenres.16295.2 Text en Copyright: © 2021 Chen Q et al. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Licence, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Open Letter
Chen, Qi
Ma, Yonghui
Labude, Markus
Schaefer, G Owen
Xafis, Vicki
Mills, Peter
Making sense of it all: Ethical reflections on the conditions surrounding the first genome-edited babies
title Making sense of it all: Ethical reflections on the conditions surrounding the first genome-edited babies
title_full Making sense of it all: Ethical reflections on the conditions surrounding the first genome-edited babies
title_fullStr Making sense of it all: Ethical reflections on the conditions surrounding the first genome-edited babies
title_full_unstemmed Making sense of it all: Ethical reflections on the conditions surrounding the first genome-edited babies
title_short Making sense of it all: Ethical reflections on the conditions surrounding the first genome-edited babies
title_sort making sense of it all: ethical reflections on the conditions surrounding the first genome-edited babies
topic Open Letter
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8340653/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34395922
http://dx.doi.org/10.12688/wellcomeopenres.16295.2
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