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Proposals For Human Reproduction

In May, Allan Rock, Minister of Health, released a "White Paper" on new medical technologies. (A white paper, in our parliamentary system, is a sort of manifesto used by a cabinet minister to set out and to justify a particular plan of action that he/she intends to implement. It is usually used to sound out public reaction to legislation.)

Mr. Rock's proposed medical technology legislation has been sent to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Health for review and will be released to the public at a later date. However, his White Paper gives us a fairly good idea of what is included in the legislation.

Legislation on New Medical
Technologies Long Overdue

Legislation on new medical technologies in Canada is long long overdue. A $28 million Royal Commission on the subject, headed by a UBC geneticist, Dr. Patricia Baird, was established in 1990. Its enormous 1,271 page, two-volume report was finally tabled in November 1993. Since then, however, absolutely nothing has been done about its mixed bag of recommendations. (See REALity, January/February 1994, "The Royal Folly on New Medical Technologies," p. 7, ")

As a result, fertility experts have continued to prey on childless couples, attempting to manufacture babies for them at a steep price, both financially and psychologically. Also, these physicians have been permitted to attend their patients in a conflict of interest position, they frequently serve as scientists attempting to advance scientific knowledge in their own research. That is, they use their patients' as guinea pigs or experimental tools with an absence of legal or ethical impediments in place to restrict them.

The Proposals Outlined
In the White Paper

The proposals outlined in the White Paper can be categorized as good, bad, and appalling.

Banned

1. The cloning of human beings (i.e., the intentional creation of identically copied human beings).
2. Alteration of the DNA of human sperm, eggs or embryos, such that the change will be transmitted to that person's children and all generations to follow, i.e., the creation of "designer children."
3. Research on embryos prohibited after 14 days.
4. No embryos to be created solely for research purposes (but research can be carried out on "extra" embryos, presumably left laying about after the allotted numbers have been implanted).
5. Embryo parts cannot be used to create another embryo for implantation into a woman to achieve a pregnancy.
6. The transplanting of animal sperm, eggs, embryos or fetuses into a human being.
7. The implantation of human reproductive material in animals in order to create a human being.
8. Gender preference or sex selection in creating an embryo (except in cases of sex-linked diseases or disorders).
9. Financial payment for the purpose of sperm or egg donations (i.e., no commercializing of human reproductive parts).
10. The sale of human embryos, including barter or exchange.
11. Commercial surrogacy (the carrying of a child for another person); however, voluntary surrogacy for altruistic purposes is acceptable.

2. Storage of sperm, eggs and embryos to be regulated, i.e., conditions set down as to how they may be stored.

Regulatory Body

A regulatory body is to be established to oversee the implementation of this proposed legislation. Such a body is to be "broadly representative of all parties interested in assisted human reproduction." [Read as: Fellow physicians and scientists who all support and approve of assisted human reproduction and experimentation.]

Contradictions

This White Paper is filled with contradictions. On the one hand, the paper states that its purpose is to prevent researchers from pushing "the frontiers of science past acceptable ethical limit." Yet it permits embryo research providing the latter are not deliberately created for research or sold or bartered. It rejects genetic alterations of human sperm, eggs or embryos so as to prevent the creation of "designer children," but permits designer children by way of artificial insemination, in vitro fertilization, and voluntary surrogacy. The paper states that the transplanting of human eggs and sperm into animals is unacceptable because it "violates the principle of human dignity," but permits, with a licence, the introduction of non-human life forms into a human embryo. It prohibits the selection of the gender of a child because Canadians believe "in the equal value and status of both sexes," but the paper remains silent about sex selection by way of abortion. Human cloning is to be banned "because it treats human beings as though they were objects and does not respect the individuality of human beings," yet the White Paper permits the manufacture of children by artificial means, who can then be discarded as so much industrial refuse should they not measure up to standards.

It's a mad, mad world that is being allowed under this proposed legislation, which will be administered, inevitably, by ambitious scientists who care little for human dignity, but a great deal about personal fame and fortune.

Please write to the following; strongly object to the contradictory, immoral and unethical experimentation on human beings proposed in the White Paper.

Your MP
House of Commons
Ottawa ON K1A 0A6

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