Informative Essay: Gene Therapy

What if there was a way to cure cancer, change skin color, or increase athleticism. Gene therapy promises to do all this and more. It aims to correct genetic abnormalities by inserting therapeutic genes into the body. Gene therapy is a fairly new practice, but it is not safe or reliable enough to become a standard treatment. One must also consider the ethical questions that arise.

In contrast, if the promoter is not functioning correctly, it could cause cell division too often thus causing the same effects as cancer. There are many steps to fixing a gene, scientists cannot move on to step two until they have successfully completed step one. Among these technical holdups, research in biotechnology has run into serious problems. In his article titled “Human Gene Therapy: Harsh Lessons, High Hopes”, Larry Thompson, tells of more setbacks the industry has come upon.

Gene therapy is a highly controversial topic that entails numerous ethical issues that need to be thoroughly analyzed before it is widely available to the public. While gene therapy may pose practical medical benefits for people, ethical considerations must be addressed in order for society to utilize the potentials of gene therapy appropriately. What is gene therapy? Gene therapy attempts to cure or treat genetic diseases by correcting the genetic errors responsible for it. Genetic diseases can be either inherited diseases such as cystic fibrosis as well as acquired diseases such as cancer ("What is Gene Therapy?").

Gene Therapy: the Danger of Enhancement I. Introduction Gene therapy has the potential to revolutionize modern medicine. The techniques of gene therapy are still in their infancy as medical treatments and there are still many problems which must be solved before gene therapy will live up to its potential. However, it is very likely that gene therapy will become a reality at some point in the future and when that time comes, the ethical questions surrounding gene therapy will be pushed to the forefront of medicine. Science may find a way to reduce the risks associated with gene therapy but science alone cannot eliminate the serious ethical and societal risks which gene therapy brings to bear on the world.

I believe human gene therapy is a good and useful tool for medicine and needs to be developed because it posses the ability to help and cure people from ailments that degrade their quality of life. One of the biggest concerns involved in gene therapy in humans is the lack of knowledge and the possibility for consequences later on or i... ... middle of paper ... ...ring deadly diseases and preventing abortions. In order for gene therapy to one day become effective much more research needs to be done to discover the consequences of altering specific genes. Also the technology of gene therapy needs to be cost effective so people who need help are able to get help. In the end gene therapy in humans needs to come a long ways before it will be widely accepted but there is great potential in the technology and it needs to be pursued.

There are also difficulties in getting the targeted cells to open up their molecular locks to allow the foreign genes inside. Gene therapy, like other medical advances before it, will have numerous failures before reaching its full potential. It will be important for the public, press, and medical industry to be patient in waiting for the dream of gene therapy to become a reality. Technological Aspects of Gene Therapy The underlying principle of gene therapy is the transfer of genetic material to specific cells of a patient in an effort to initiate a biological response to fight or eliminate a disease. There are two possible types of target cells, somatic cells that are non-reproducing, or reproducing germ-line cells.

Stem cells are the future to medical breakthroughs; many ethical concerns regarding where they come from constantly has governments changing their opinion. Every day there are new developments on the future of this research; there are now ways to avoid the ethical issues surrounding embryonic stem cells. Stem cells have two main characteristics which separate them from all other cells. The first is: stem cells are unspecialized and they can renew themselves through cell division (Simmonds). The cell division can occur after long periods of inactivity (“Stem Cell Basics”).

- Ann E. Weiss Rapid advances in medical science have fuelled the question of bioethics. However, as science takes leaps and bounds towards its goals, ethics are often just learning how to crawl. In fact, it has even suffered major backslides in some cases. Genetic engineering "raises serious ethical questions about the right of human beings to alter life on the planet". Changing the basic physical traits of an organism can lead to an unprecedented threat to life on the planet".

Medicine is by means of biotechnology practices so much in detecting and remedying disparate diseases. Biotechnology is recurrently pondered on the same with biomedical research; moreover, there are copious amounts of other industries, which take benefit of biotechnology method for studying, cloning, and varying genes. Society has become familiar to the ... ... middle of paper ... ...licy, practice, and research. Bioethicists are apprehensive with the ethical questions that arise in the relationships among life sciences, biotechnology, medicine, politics, law, and philosophy. It also embraces the study of the more conventional inquiries of values ("the ethics of the ordinary"), which arise in primary care and other subdivisions of medicine.

Stem Cell Research Works Cited Not Included Stem cell research is a highly controversial topic that may hold the key to developing a cure for many cancers and diseases. In 1998, a group of scientists developed a technique to isolate and grow stem cells. The field is extremely new when compared with other fields. A few things need to be discussed before an argument can be made for or against stem cell research, the types of stem cells, the potential uses, and where funding should come from. There are many different types of stem cells and each one has a different role in promoting breakthroughs in the many diseases that can possibly be cured.