Rescue Siblings

Rescue siblings or rescue babies are children who are artificially conceived and selected by their parents in order to help a sick sibling with their appropriate genetic material . These are embryos that have been artificially created from the union of different genetic material.

They are conceived by in vitro fertilization and selected by the parents using pre-implantation diagnostics . Savior sibling should therefore be cell donor for otherwise terminally ill older siblings, for example, as donors for stem cells of the bone marrow . Shortly after the birth, umbilical cord blood stem cells can be obtained from the umbilical cord blood of the rescue sibling, which can then be used for transplantation into the sick sibling. Stem cells from umbilical cord blood have the advantage over those from bone marrow that they are more capable of dividing and are especially important for therapeutic approaches in the area of cloning and rescue siblings. The Regenerative Medicine operates to intensively on developing new medical fields of application in stem cell research. With the help of cultivations from stem cells, sick and destroyed cells, types of tissue, bones and even organs can be treated.

Rescue siblings are sometimes assigned to the so-called designer babies. The term “designer baby”, however, also includes a targeted change in the genes of embryos, in which the characteristics desired by the parents (e.g. intelligence, sportiness) are preferred. Such manipulation is not a prerequisite for rescue siblings and so far not technically possible.

history

Jamie Whitaker

The first “designer baby” in Europe, Jamie, was born in 2003 in the UK , according to reports from BBC-online . The umbilical cord of Jamie should help the elderly with cancer brother Charlie. According to his parents, Jamie has been genetically selected as an embryo so that he can help his four-year-old brother. The genetic tests were not carried out in the UK but in the US because UK law does not allow this procedure.

Javier

Javier was born on October 13, 2008. He is the first “designer baby” in Spain and is supposed to cure his older brother. After artificial insemination, the doctors at the Virgen del Rocío hospital in Seville , using pre-implantation diagnostics, selected the embryo that did not have the genetic defect and genetically best suited Andrés Jr. Using the cells from his little brother's umbilical cord blood, he will now have a bone marrow transplant . Doctors see the chances of recovery at 70 to 90 percent. If everything goes well, Andrés will be completely healthy in five years. The parents don't want to know anything about the term “designer baby”. "We have always wanted a second child."

British Embryo Act

The UK House of Commons , after months of debate, passed a controversial law allowing rescue siblings to be produced among other things. 355 MPs voted for the text in the vote on October 22, 2008, 129 MPs voted against.

criticism

Rescue siblings are ethically controversial because they require a targeted selection of a suitable fertilized egg. This also means that other fertilized egg cells are not selected and therefore have no chance of further life, because they would not be considered as donors for the older, sick sibling. The therapy concepts based on rescue siblings move in the field of tension between ethical and legal issues. That is why the demand for a new legal regulation and an expansion of embryo protection is being discussed intensively in the Federal Republic.

Individual evidence

^ Samuel GN, Strong KA, Kerridge I, Jordens CF, Ankeny R, Shaw PJ: What place do "savior siblings" have in pediatric transplantation: establishing the role of pre-implantation genetic diagnosis with HLA typing . In: Arch. Dis. Child. . August 2008. doi : 10.1136 / adc.2008.138529 . PMID 18684746 .
↑ Paul Weingartner: Human resource, the liquid gold of the future ?: Can ethics be privatized? (= Science and religion; 20 ). Vienna et al., Frankfurt am Main 2009, ISBN 978-3-631-57611-3 ( univie.ac.at [accessed October 4, 2018]).
↑ Spriggs M, Savulescu J: "Savior siblings" . In: J Med Ethics . 28, No. 5, October 2002, p. 289. PMID 12356953 . PMC 1733641 (free full text).
↑ http://www.innovations-report.de/html/berichte/medizin_gesundheit/bericht-19371.html , accessed November 15, 2008, 11:15 pm
↑ 'Designer baby' born to UK couple
↑ Jörg Vogelsänger: Blood Brother: “Designer Baby” divides Spain. n-tv.de, October 15, 2008, archived from the original on January 16, 2009 ; Retrieved February 4, 2016 .
↑ Martin Berger: Embryo Protection and Cloning in Humans - Novel Therapy Concepts Between Ethics and Law: Approaches to Developing a New Regulatory Model for the Federal Republic of Germany; with special consideration of the legal situation in Great Britain and Switzerland as well as international regulations and agreements (= Law & Medicine; 81 ). Vienna et al., Frankfurt am Main 2007, ISBN 978-3-631-55412-8 ( univie.ac.at [accessed October 4, 2018]).

literature

Alena M. Buyx : Tissue typing and savior siblings: considerations on a special application of pre-implantation diagnostics. In: Carl Friedrich Gethmann (Ed.): Law and ethics in pre-implantation diagnostics . Fink, Munich 2010. ISBN 978-3-7705-5088-3 . Pp. 211-229
Werner Wolbert : Is there an obligation to procreate "savior siblings"? In: Paul Weingartner (Ed.): Human resource, the liquid gold of the future? Can ethics be privatized? Lang, Frankfurt am Main 2009. ISBN 978-3-631-57611-3 . Pp. 253-274

[pmid18684746-1] Samuel GN, Strong KA, Kerridge I, Jordens CF, Ankeny R, Shaw PJ: What place do "savior siblings" have in pediatric transplantation: establishing the role of pre-implantation genetic diagnosis with HLA typing . In: Arch. Dis. Child. . August 2008. doi : 10.1136 / adc.2008.138529 . PMID 18684746 .

[2] Paul Weingartner: Human resource, the liquid gold of the future ?: Can ethics be privatized? (= Science and religion; 20 ). Vienna et al., Frankfurt am Main 2009, ISBN 978-3-631-57611-3 ( univie.ac.at [accessed October 4, 2018]).

[pmid12356953-3] Spriggs M, Savulescu J: "Savior siblings" . In: J Med Ethics . 28, No. 5, October 2002, p. 289. PMID 12356953 . PMC 1733641 (free full text).

[4] ttp://www.innovations-report.de/html/berichte/medizin_gesundheit/bericht-19371.html , accessed November 15, 2008, 11:15 pm

[5] 'Designer baby' born to UK couple

[6] Jörg Vogelsänger: Blood Brother: “Designer Baby” divides Spain. n-tv.de, October 15, 2008, archived from the original on January 16, 2009 ; Retrieved February 4, 2016 .

[7] Martin Berger: Embryo Protection and Cloning in Humans - Novel Therapy Concepts Between Ethics and Law: Approaches to Developing a New Regulatory Model for the Federal Republic of Germany; with special consideration of the legal situation in Great Britain and Switzerland as well as international regulations and agreements (= Law & Medicine; 81 ). Vienna et al., Frankfurt am Main 2007, ISBN 978-3-631-55412-8 ( univie.ac.at [accessed October 4, 2018]).