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      <title>Bioethics Project by </title>
      <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem</link>
      <description>Should we use IVF beyond medical reasons, such as for enhancement?</description>
      <language>en-us</language>
      <pubDate>2022-11-21 20:13:16 UTC</pubDate>
      <lastBuildDate>2022-11-22 17:28:18 UTC</lastBuildDate>
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      <item>
         <title>Preimplantation Genetic Testing</title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393139745</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div>PGT screens embryos created through IVF. Parents can use PGT to find embryos with chromosomal abnormalities or with the risk of genetic diseases, and then select the healthiest embryo to implant. PGT can also screen for other non-medical traits of the embryo.&nbsp;</div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-21 20:14:13 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393139745</guid>
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      <item>
         <title>In-Vitro Fertilisation</title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393781111</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div>IVF is a medical procedure where an egg is fertilised outside the body, then implanted back into the uterus to be carried to term. It is often used in cases of infertility.</div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 08:10:22 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393781111</guid>
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      <item>
         <title>Facts &amp; Stats</title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393789723</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div>- Carrier screening is a 1.7 billion dollar industry<br>-As the practice becomes more popularised, it's being used by healthy fertile couples who could have conceived traditionally<br>-DNA is not destiny. A lot of our traits, such as IQ, musical ability, and being gay or straight, are influenced both by heredity and environment. You can't control these outcomes through IVF<br>-Experts predict that in 40-50 years, designer babies will be&nbsp; common<br>-43% of American IVF clinics reported that the requests they receive for PGT raise concerning ethical questions<br>-1/10 tests are used for non-medical sex selection<br><br></div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 08:18:19 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393789723</guid>
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      <item>
         <title>Parents who...</title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393792411</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div>-want to avoid the risk of having a child with a genetic disease&nbsp;<br>-may want certain features (either theirs or their partner's) to be passed on to their child<br>-who will spend thousands of dollars into IVF treatments that may or may not take</div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 08:20:33 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393792411</guid>
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      <item>
         <title>Babies who...</title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393793176</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div>-could be born with certain genetic diseases if they are not genetically tested before IVF<br>-can also not consent to having their traits be predetermined and picked over other alternatives</div>]]></description>
         <enclosure url="" />
         <pubDate>2022-11-22 08:21:15 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393793176</guid>
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      <item>
         <title></title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393798787</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div>The ethical principle of <strong>non-maleficence</strong> argues that we are obligated to avoid harmful outcomes. IVF and PGT allow us to asses risks in order to maximise benefits and minimise harm. Eliminating genetic disorders and propensity for late-life diseases falls in line with this principle. To go further and use IVF non-medically, such as for enhancement, would fall under the principle of <strong>beneficence</strong>, which promotes positive outcomes and benefits.&nbsp;</div><div>For instance, new advancements with IVF have opened the doors to embryo selection based on intelligence and IQ. The company Genomic Prediction uses polygenic risk scores to catch embryos which "are genetic outliers, giving prospective parents the option of avoiding embryos with a high chance of an IQ 25 points below average".</div><div>Furthermore, MIT predicts that selecting embryos for intelligence could boost babies' IQ by 15 points. <br>Enhancement, especially when it comes to increasing the intelligence of future humans, is therefore in line with the principle of <strong>beneficence</strong>.&nbsp;</div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 08:26:01 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393798787</guid>
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      <item>
         <title></title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393869449</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div><strong>Autonomy</strong> is the ethical principle of human dignity and freedom. Patients should always be treated with either their consent or the consent of their parents.&nbsp;<br>While a baby may not consent to, say, having their eye colour be pre-determined, its parents have the right to make that decision both legally and ethically. This technology upholds parents' autonomy by supporting their right to choose and reproductive liberty.</div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 09:28:33 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393869449</guid>
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         <title></title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393875514</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<blockquote>"Science should be used to control human reproduction in order to breed preferred types of people.”</blockquote><div><br>Robert G. Edwards, who pioneered the invention of IVF, was a leader of the Eugenics Society of Britain. <br>Negative eugenics is is when "undesirable traits" are weeded out of society through forced sterilisation or genocide. Post-WW2, this was seen as too extreme. Instead, positive eugenics were seen as the better alternative. This approach focuses on selectively breeding favourable traits so that they eventually overtake all others.<br>As someone who subscribed to this ideology, Edwards, in creating IVF, gave eugenicists a tool that would aid in accomplishing their goals. He even stated that he wanted IVF to be used non-medically. So, while IVF isn't inherently eugenic, its <strong>unintended consequence</strong> is that it is necessary for modern eugenics. &nbsp;</div><div><br></div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 09:33:43 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393875514</guid>
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      <item>
         <title></title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393888540</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div>With PGT, sex is really easy to screen for. This must be taken into account when considering<strong> unintended consequences</strong> of this technology.&nbsp;<br>Many places around the world have a preference for boys and thus engage in the practice of sex-selective abortions. IVF can contribute to this sexist culture by enabling parents to discard female embryos.<br>Not only does this set back the fight for gender equality and women's rights, but it also impacts the male population and society at large.&nbsp;<br>South Korea was one of the first Asian countries to introduce sex-selective technologies to the public, and this has massively distorted their sex ratio at birth (SRB). While the worldwide average is 101 males to 100 females, some South Korean cities started reporting SRBs as high as 125 males per 100 females.&nbsp;<br>It is anticipated that thanks to prenatal sex determination, parts of India and China will have a 10-20 percent excess of young men. This shortage of women allows them to marry up, leaving many men (mainly lower class) without partners.<br>Experts hypothesise that not marrying and having children is linked to psychological issues in men, and this, combined with sexual frustration, can often lead to aggression. After all, most violent crime is perpetrated by unmarried, low-status men.<br>So, using IVF non-medically for sex selection doesn't only negatively affect women, but men too, as well as deepening economic divides and inequalities.&nbsp;</div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 09:44:19 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393888540</guid>
      </item>
      <item>
         <title></title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393888802</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<blockquote>"DNA testing will create a society that further values certain types of children more than others"</blockquote><div><br>Parents hope their child succeeds in life and, if given the ability to do so, would give their child any advantages possible. But what we deem as advantageous can be problematic, especially in terms of physical traits. It is important to take into account that no one is immune from prejudice. When it comes to enhancement and picking certain features, "'[t]hese kinds of decisions can feed into...discrimination, not fight against it’'". &nbsp;<br>In reality, selecting any superficial trait over another could not really be "enhancing" a person, since beauty is subjective. But what is cause for concern is that people consider certain features to be superior than others in the first place. Especially when those trait preferences are often rooted in racism, using IVF in this manner would reinforce those ideas.</div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 09:44:34 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2393888802</guid>
      </item>
      <item>
         <title></title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394000817</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div>The <strong>needs and solidarity principle</strong> is applied in regards to public health, and it states that resources should be allocated to patients who are in the greatest need. Therefore, IVF should be used to address severe health problems, not selecting superficial traits. IVF is becoming more popular, even for people who are not infertile and could have conceived traditionally because it offers prospective parents the opportunity to select desired traits. Using IVF for enhancement, according to this school of thought, would technically be considered a waste of resources.</div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 11:26:45 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394000817</guid>
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         <title></title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394131092</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<blockquote>“Choices will be made, and if informed people do not participate in making those choices, ignorant people will make them”</blockquote><div><br>Regardless of the stance someone takes regarding IVF and the extent to which it should be used, it is undeniable that the technology is evolving and becoming increasingly popular. A potential <strong>unintended consequence </strong>would be the practice becoming common among an uninformed public. Instead, promoting IVF for enhancement (which is very attractive to people) will help to educate the masses and encourage the responsible use of IVF.</div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 13:16:33 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394131092</guid>
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         <title></title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394189794</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div>Regalado, A. (2020, April 2). <em>Eugenics 2.0: We’re at the Dawn of Choosing Embryos by Health, Height, and More</em>. MIT Technology Review. https://www.technologyreview.com/2017/11/01/105176/eugenics-20-were-at-the-dawn-of-choosing-embryos-by-health-height-and-more/</div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 13:55:49 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394189794</guid>
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         <title></title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394190241</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div>Obasogie, O. K. (2013, October 4). <em>Commentary: The Eugenics Legacy of the Nobelist Who Fathered IVF</em>. Scientific American. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/eugenic-legacy-nobel-ivf/</div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 13:56:04 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394190241</guid>
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         <title></title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394190516</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div>Lewis, R., PhD. (2020, May 18). <em>Are Eurocentric Genetic Databases Hampering Health Care?</em> DNA Science. https://dnascience.plos.org/2019/03/21/are-eurocentric-genetic-databases-hampering-health-care/</div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 13:56:15 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394190516</guid>
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         <title></title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394190915</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div><em>NCBI - WWW Error Blocked Diagnostic</em>. (n.d.-b). https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7721055/</div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 13:56:28 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394190915</guid>
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         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394191397</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div>Marcus, A. D. (2018, October 2). <em>Is It Ethical to Choose Your Baby’s Eye Color?</em> WSJ. https://www.wsj.com/articles/is-it-ethical-to-choose-your-babys-eye-color-1538487936</div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 13:56:39 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394191397</guid>
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         <title></title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394191845</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div>Ball, P. (2018, October 9). <em>Designer babies: an ethical horror waiting to happen?</em> The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/jan/08/designer-babies-ethical-horror-waiting-to-happen</div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 13:56:50 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394191845</guid>
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         <title>where do we draw the line</title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394192043</link>
         <description><![CDATA[]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 13:56:57 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394192043</guid>
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      <item>
         <title></title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394457545</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div>At the end of the day, there are really just two options: use IVF and PGD to screen for any illnesses and selecting the healthiest embryo, or use IVF and PGD to select an embryo, not just because it’s the healthiest, but because of other non-medical features such as sex, height, eye colour, etc.</div><div>After researching this subject, my personal opinion is that <strong>IVF and PGD should not be used for the purpose of selecting non-medical traits.</strong><br>My main concern with IVF for enhancement is how it can be used to perpetuate various forms of discrimination.<br>Though parents having preferences for certain features isn’t necessarily a problem at the individual level, historically, the extent to which some may go to attain these traits has been extreme. To achieve their vision of racial purity, eugenicists want to selectively breed out humanity’s “undesirable traits”. To them, a tool like IVF would be helpful in accomplishing this, and the fact that its creator openly subscribed to this ideology is a big red flag.<br>Another unintended consequence of IVF is how it can perpetuate sexism. IVF can contribute to prenatal sex discrimination as sex is very easy to screen for. We’ve already seen the consequences of this technology being adopted for this use, as it creates a shortage of women and an oversupply of men.&nbsp;<br>These negative impacts demonstrate the way that, when used for enhancement, IVF violates critical bioethical principles.<br>The consequences of using IVF for enhancement, to me, massively outweigh its benefits. I think that IVF even being available to parents is already upholding their reproductive freedoms, and to limit the use of this technology just to screening out illnesses would not infringe on their bodily autonomy.&nbsp;<br>Now, the question becomes what is considered a disease versus a superficial characteristic, given that not all conditions fall obviously into either camp. Where do we draw the line?<br>While this is up to personal opinion, I think that anything that threatens the health or well-being of the child could be designated as an illness that IVF could be used for. But traits that are otherwise neutral and would not endanger the child's health should be off-limits.&nbsp;<br>To put it simply, just because we can does not mean we should.&nbsp;<br><br><br><br></div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 16:56:07 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394457545</guid>
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         <title></title>
         <author>valeriaramirez2004</author>
         <link>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394487466</link>
         <description><![CDATA[<div>Wilson, C. (2018, November 16). <em>Exclusive: A new test can predict IVF embryos' risk of having a low IQ</em>. New Scientist. https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg24032041-900-exclusive-a-new-test-can-predict-ivf-embryos-risk-of-having-a-low-iq/</div>]]></description>
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         <pubDate>2022-11-22 17:21:07 UTC</pubDate>
         <guid>https://padlet.com/valeriaramirez2004/cwcibunw6lj0knem/wish/2394487466</guid>
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