http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=313952005
MPs call for re-write on laws of creation
KAREN MCVEIGH
Key points
"¢ MPs' report recommends selection embryos on sex or genetic imperfections
"¢ Report also to allow for half-human half-animal embryos for research
"¢ Half of committee dismiss conclusions; watchdogs call them 'libertarian'
Key quote
"Taboo subjects such as cloning, chimeras and hybrids and so-called eugenics must be tackled head-on in a rational debate leading to principled and coherent legislation" - conclusion of summary to report
Story in full MPs will today recommend giving the go-ahead to couples to create "designer babies" and allowing the experimental implantation of human embryos into animals, as part of a radical shake-up in fertility laws.
If accepted, it could allow couples, in consultation with their doctors, to select embryos on the basis of their sex, to weed out genetic imperfections, or to create a "saviour sibling" - a child that can provide life- saving treatment to an ill brother or sister.
The science and technology select committee report, which will also recommend the scrapping of regulators, the Human Fertility and Embryology Authority, has criticised the precautionary approach used up until now, instead arguing that new technologies should be used until harm is proved.
But late last night, a few hours before the study was due to be officially published, half of the committee launched a scathing attack on its findings and condemned a "rush to publish" by the other members.
In a statement, five of the ten committee members branded the long-awaited study "flawed, unbalanced, light on ethics ... too far in the direction of deregulation ... too dismissive of public opinion and much of the evidence".
They dismissed the conclusions as unrepresentative and "extremely libertarian" and said that they could never sign up to them. The split - right down the middle of the committee - reflects a fierce public debate on the subject, which continued yesterday, with watchdogs also condemning the findings as "libertarian and unethical".
Dr David King, director of Human Genetics Alert, said: "The kind of ethics we see in this report, which is incapable of saying a clear no to anything, is no ethics at all. Even when dealing with human genetic engineering, cloning or the creation of human-animal hybrids, the committee wants to remove existing protections."
The report will conclude that the 1984 Warnock Report"™s recognition that the embryo had a special status, deserving of respect, should be retained.
But in the light of the "changes in social attitudes" and practice of assisted reproduction, the reproductive decisions of individuals should be limited only if "there is evidence of harms or potential harms" to individuals or society.
The report will call for less regulation over human reproductive technologies and place an emphasis on "patients making decisions in consultation with their doctors".
In an informal summary, the five MPs who voted for the study concluded that there was "little evidence that sex selection" for family-balancing "risked harm to individuals or society".
Screening for genetic defects that can cause illness would still work within a legal and ethical framework. However, the MPs recommended that the extent of screening ought no longer to be dictated by a regulator, but agreed between patients and doctors.
The summary also concluded: "Taboo subjects such as cloning, chimeras and hybrids and so-called eugenics must be tackled head-on in a rational debate leading to principled and coherent legislation."
Committee member Dr Evan Harris said that it was more ethical to permit research on chimeras, an embryo which is half-human half-animal, than it was to permit research on human embryos. "Currently, human embryos can be used for research up to 14 days, so a ban where you say, "˜You can use a human embryo but not an animal-human embryo"™ would not be rational," he said.
Mr Harris also said that the committee disagreed with the ban on reproductive cloning.
The report will criticise the HFEA for its "excessive use of the precautionary principle" and calls for it to be disbanded.
In its place would be a new Regulatory Agency for Fertility and Tissues, which would have much more limited powers.
Its remit would be to ensure that assisted conception clinics and research laboratories met high technical and management standards. The broader legal and ethical issues would be left to the government and parliament.
Another recommendation is the setting up of a cross-party joint parliamentary bioethics committee, drawn from both Houses of Parliament, which would vet all new fertility legislation.
The committee also recommended a reversal of a change in the law, coming into force next month, lifting the anonymity of egg and sperm donors.
Donors and patients should be free to choose to remain anonymous if they wish, said the report.
But the five dissenting members, the Labour MPs Paul Farrelly, Kate Hoey, Tony McWalter and Geraldine Smith and the Conservative MP Bob Spink, said yesterday that they could never sign up to such recommendation as "hybrid animal/human embryos, unregulated creation of embryos for research and unregulated screening out of disorders in embryos for reproduction".
A vote accepting the conclusions was taken by the committee on March 14 and passed by four to one. But four of the five members dissenting were not present and one left early.
The five said that the committee had agreed to issue a special report recording their dissent. They were unhappy yesterday at the decision by the remaining five members of the committee to release the summary findings - without their dissenting voices.
The summary report, published yesterday, bore the names of the chairman, Dr Ian Gibson, and the four members who voted in favour - Robert Key, Dr Evan Harris, Dr Brian Iddon and Dr Des Turner.
Evan Harris, Liberal Democrat MP, dismissed the concerns of the dissenting five. He said that the report would be published, as planned, at midnight last night.
"We voted 4-1, plus the chairman, for this report on 14 March," he said. "Those who didn"™t feel strongly didn"™t turn up. Five of them aren"™t happy, but some of them are pro-life - they were never going to be happy. The report is a majority report."
The committee chairman, the Labour MP Ian Gibson, used his casting vote to approve it.
"¢ Report to allow for half-human half-animal embryos for research
