[paula_w]

IMHO

Regardless of how one thinks about research, embryos are fertilized and are human. They are like raw cookie dough waiting to be placed in the oven to develop into cookies. This article is tellling; making it harder to see it as ethical to destroy embryos, but there are exceptions.....like blindness, paralysis. severe and torturous quality of life.

mass prodcution of embryonic stem cells for research remains very questionably ethical.

I'll sign up for IBS or adult cell, especially our own. But this triplet situation is weird enough [and not the only one ] without people calling for the triplet's demise - then put her in an ice pack and multiply her in a lab? i realize it's not cloning. This is not going to cure pd. Will probably make people a lot of money. never thought i'd quote Dave Weldon but i think i finally see his point when he said, "you're being duped by the industry". Dave Weldon is an MD and my former state representative.

If they can do this, [produce siblngs later on that were fertilized at the same time, then fertility clinics are about life through experimentation. The argument that they are going to be destroyed anyway will soon become [No reason not to donate just for this reason or at least an extra few so you can help people thru research? There is a universe of ethical differences between the two.

Sounds like embryonic stem cells is becoming organized as a money maker.

We talk about prevention. Whose to say this triplet would or wouldn't be implanted and born years later? Not if it's destroyed. It just doesn't pass my ethical ever- present feelings of guilt about this issue.

http://abcnews.go.com/Health/eleven-...ry?id=12492208

[lindylanka]

Hi Paula,
This article refers to something that happened just down the road from where I live, and in a town where I worked for many years.

The mother of the 'triplets' had a condition that can mean infertility, and so her fertilized eggs were frozen and kept on ice all these year. More than she could need, as so many do not actually take when the implant happens. I think this is fairly standard practice, and there are many eggs like this, both stored and, if they do not take, wasted.

This is an expensive process, but over here at least, I do not think it is exploitative, the ethical concerns will certainly have been very carefully considered. However I do see where you are coming from, isn't the proof of the complexity of the ethics in the two existing 'twins' . These are not easy questions, and it is where this kind of process will take us as humans. Is this a beginning to something that will become exploitative, or is it simply a medical procedure that will bring happiness to the individual family, who otherwise may not have had the joy of these children.........

so the ESC issue makes it even more problematic........ I'd rather they used our dandruff than embryos , and think that there will be equally usable sources of stem cells that will obviate the need to go down the ESC road.......

It is up to society to make sure that the balance is in the favor of people, and not money.

I think this story has been to some degree charged with the sensational by the use of the twin/triplet context - the media now is like a a peepshow into anything out of the ordinary, that's why this story has been picked up, though it probably originated in some press release from the hospital it was done in, trying to maintain a good profile - but this will be an ordinary family, like that of the many others who have children conceived in this way.

You always raise good question!

Lindy