Embryo manipulation and experimentation.

Abstract

I have argued that early human embryos are not human beings, and do not have normal rights. Like human sperm and ova, they are both alive and biologically human. However, they lack the physiological development necessary to sustain a capacity for sentience. If Ford is right, then they are not yet individual human organisms. But the more important point is that their lack of a capacity for sentience makes them inappropriate candidates for the ascription of moral rights. Thus, research on human embryos produced in vitro is not a wrong against them--at least so long as experimentally manipulated embryos are not returned to the womb, or artificially gestated to a stage at which they might become sentient. Some of the more difficult issues about embryo experimentation involve the rights of women as experimental subject and donors. The consent of both male and female gamete donors should normally be required for the production or experimental use of IVF embryos. (Possible exceptions might include cases in which one or both progenitors have died, and the survivor or other responsible family member wished to donate the (frozen) IVF embryos for research or other uses.) However, it is women's rights that are most apt to be endangered, for example, if the large scale therapeutic or commercial use of human embryos leads to a demand for large numbers of ova. Thus, it is vital that researchers and policy-makers heed feminist concerns about embryo research and the new biomedical technologies it may yield. Given adequate information and appropriate procedural protections, women are capable of making autonomous decisions about donating ova or embryos for biomedical research. But regulatory safeguards are needed to ensure against their being coerced, deceived, or manipulated into becoming ovum or embryo donors. As Daniel Callahan has detailed, biomedical technology has reached the point where we can no longer afford to provide everyone with all of the innovative therapies that might prove beneficial (Callahan, 1989, p 523). Thus, questions about the just and cost-effective distribution of medical resources will become increasingly difficult and important. Among these questions will be whether it is wise or just to invest large sums in the development of innovative methods of assisting human reproduction. We must also consider the interests of future persons who may suffer because of the methods used to bring them into existence.(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 400 WORDS)