Genetic Engineering
A girl is born without Tay-Sachs disease, a devasting genetic disorder that
has
decimated a lot of babies worldwide. A leukemia patient has defective
bone
marrow replaced with healthy bone marrow that was cloned from tissue
from her
own cells. These futuristic scenarios are not part of the debate for
genetic
engineering but they should be. Many people are afraid that somebody
will clone
Hitler or some evil person, but that is far from the fact.
Genetic engineering
can be used to make many aspects of human life better,
including saving lives.
The rapid development of humanity’s ability to
control the gene will
eventually lead to a promising future for the entire
planet as a whole. Genetic
engineering resulted not from the belief that
nature should be manipulated and
perfected by humanity. Rather, its principle
aim is, as of any other technology,
to improve the quality of life for the
people of this planet. Therefore, it is
necessary to weigh the benefits and
consequences of this relatively recent
breakthrough and determine in which
ways it can be used to humanity’s best
advantage. This speech will
investigate the ways in which genetic engineering
affects two important areas
in today’s society. The first one will be the
improvement of the world’s
agricultural techniques. With an ever-increasing
growth in world population,
the Earth’s resources are constantly becoming
scarce. The advent of genetic
engineering may be used to avert the occurrence of
worldwide famine and
starvation. The second one investigated will be in the
field of medical
development and study. Currently, genetic diseases are
decimating the world’s
population. Thousands of people have already died
without a single worthy
treatment or cure. Worldwide acceptance and support of
this technology would
aid in our battle against these diseases. According to the
United Nations
medium projections issued in 1990 (Population Council, 1994), the
global
population will be increasing from 5.3 billion in 1990 to 8.5 billion in
the
year 2025. Consequently, there will be a much greater need for
food,
therefore accelerating further the consumption of Earth’s resources.
To
achieve this, it would be necessary to extensively use agricultural
technology.
However our current use of pesticides and other chemical
fertilizers pose a
serious evironmental threat. Using genetic engineering
would ultimately reduce
the amount of potentially dangerous chemical
substances we introduce into the
environment. It would as well make food
production more efficient therefore
reducing distribution costs. Thanks to
genetic engineering, Geneticists are
currently able to create a resistant
strain of the ordinary supermarket tomato
(Pen*censored*, 1992). Using a
technique called antisense genetics, the gene
that is responsible for
allowing tomatoes to soften and ripen can be transformed
to produce the
opposite effect. The billions of tomatoes that circulating all
around the
world can therefore be made to resist the normal abuse of shipping
and
transport, and also having a longer shelf life. This practice could
be
applied to all other sorts of fruits and vegetables. This would allow for
less
of a waste of food therefore, putting less of a strain on human
resources.
Diseases and genetic defects have always been a major cause of
concern for our
society. Antibiotics, which used to be successful against
pathogens, are now
starting to become useless since the viruses have become
resistant to the
medications administered. Therefore a proposed alternative
is the use of genetic
engineering or more specifically, gene therapy, to cure
diseases at the DNA
level. This method is known as biotechnology and can aid
in the treatment of
diseases like a hormone defiency. Currently, a common
diagnostic practice with
unborn fetuses is the process of genetic screening.
A needle is inserted into
the uterus of the pregnant woman and is used to
extract some amniotic fluid. As
a result, several hundred diseases and
defects can be diagnosed before birth
(Office of Technology, 1990). Therefore
parents can choose to have an abortion
if they do not want their child to
have a defect. For over two centuries,
vaccination has changed very little
from the time of Edward Jenner, the first
physician to have ever tried the
method on a human being (Yong Kang, 1989). But
this process has now become
obsolete because by killing the virus, it is more
likely to mutate into a
more resistant strain for which is incurable. As a
result, every new strain
would require a new vaccine costing more money and
time. A new method of
producing vaccines is currently being studied and involves
recombining the
DNA of the virus so that it will not be able to reproduce. This
would be as
effective as a regular vaccine except without the chance of
mutation. If
genetic engineering becomes unrestricted the world would become a
better
place. Worldwide famine and starvation could possibly end through the use
of
technology in the agriculture field. The death rate would go down and
very
dramatically in Third World countries. We could see the end of diseases
like
AIDS and conditions like hemophilia. If you are interested in
supporting genetic
engineering you can write to your congressman and ask him
or her to vote down
the restrictions on genetic engineering. You can also
make a petition a send it
to your governor.
Bibliography
Page
Coates, Joseph F. "The Promise of Genetics." Futurist
September/October
1997: 18-22. Sirs Researcher. Online. Netscape. 9 April 1998.
Office of
Technology Assessment, Biology, Medicine, and the Bill of Rights,
(1990,
September 1). Chapter 4A Human Genetics and the Constitution,
U.S.
History. Bureau of Electronic Publishing. Pendick, Daniel. "Industry
Serves Up
the Fruit of Tomato Biotechnology", Science News 11 Nov. 1992: 376
Population
Council, The, (1994). "Population", Microsoft Encarta ’95.
Funk and
Wagnall’s Corporation Yong, Kang C. "Vaccine Production by
Recombinant DNA
Technology." Pergamon Press 15 Feb. 1993: 39-62