Choosing a deaf child

[MJ]

Is it wrong to select a deaf embryo?

New fertility legislation will make it illegal to use embryos with a known genetic abnormality in IVF treatment when ones without the same defect are available.

 

For a long time, the debate about the genetic testing of embryos has focused on whether we should stop people creating the "perfect" person: blonde, blue-eyed, with athletic prowess and a high IQ.

 

The Nazi spectre of eugenics has frequently been invoked.

 

Now a deaf couple have turned this on its head: far from wanting a flawless child they actively want a baby which suffers the same hearing difficulties as they themselves.

 

Just heard this one on Radio Scotland. It's an interesting dilemma. Personally I don't agree with selectively choosing embryos for their genetic make up. Children should come the way they come.

Creating children (for example) as spare parts for siblings I personally find morally repugnant.

But should a deaf embryo be actively selected to fit into a deaf household. Hearing households can where there a genetic chance of deafness can actively select a hearing embryo, so where's the difference?

[ArabiaTerra]

I think this is utterly selfish on the part of the prospective parents. What about the child? It doesn't get a choice. To bring a deliberately disabled child into the world is unethical, in fact it's unthinkable. I think this is disgusting.

 

Do you think this would even be discussed if they wanted a thalidomide baby? The difference is only a matter of degree. The child comes first.

[Njugle]

This tends toward a similar moral debate of several years ago when the technology to provide the deaf with 'bionic ears', well, not quite but a device implanted inside the skull behind the ear could provide rudimentary hearing for the deaf. Announcement of the availability of this technology were met with outcry and protest from some of the deaf community as it was thought that this was undermining deaf rights and portraying their lack of hearing as a disability. To some deaf people, there should always be deaf people and it is seen as perhaps a cultural issue that deafness should be preserved.

[Fjool]

To some deaf people, there should always be deaf people and it is seen as perhaps a cultural issue that deafness should be preserved.

Which strikes me, perhaps somewhat bigotedly, as a barking mad attitude. Deafness is not a cultural thing, it is a disability. Are these people claiming disabled living allowance by any chance?

 

Are there people who deliberately make themselves deaf in order to be part of this 'cultural' phenomena? I highly doubt it.

[Njugle]

Don't let me put words in their mouths, cultural thing is my interpretation and there is nothing to suggest that they are claiming any benefit. Many deaf people do conventional jobs.

 

The less deaf people there are the less society will provide for them in terms of signing on TV and teaching of sign language. Then it becomes more of a bigotry against them, rather than by them.

[JAStewart]

The argument, as the article says, is one of eugenics. If you stop 'deaf' embryos, what else can you stop? People who would have slight disabilities (like ginger hair... sorry, had to do it!!). However deaf people require more attention than non-deaf people and are a bigger responsibility.

 

We practice eugenics on animals on a huge scale. The meat that you buy from the supermarket comes from animals which have been picked for their attributes and not picked just because they are a normal cow. Do we care about that? On what level do we rank ourselves morally above animals? If you're against selective breeding in human society does this view trickle down through to animals?

[Fjool]

It's not a question of eugenics though really. It's one thing to have a child naturally and care for it regardless of whether it is deaf or not. I have no argument with this.

 

It is quite another thing, however, to deliberately seek to produce a deaf child. Or to prevent a child from receiving treatment which would allow it to hear a fire alarm, for example.

 

If the parents are simply saying, "let's take whichever embryo", then that's just fine. However, these parents "actively want a baby which suffers the same hearing difficulties as they themselves" which is craxy*, imho.

 

*(The x is for eXtra)

[Para Handy]

How far does it go could you have the Mother in-law genetically modified so see had no tongue

[Frances144]

Both my kids are the result of IVF in the 1990's.

 

Unless everything has changed radically since then, we did not have the option of choosing the embryos that were put back. We took what looked the most viable, crossed everything, prayed to anyone and wished like hell that it would work.

 

The success rate was not fantastic, but you certainly did not have the luxury of going in with a shopping list!

 

Fx