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WOMEN'S AND CHILDREN'S HEALTH

Efforts to produce cloned or genetically modified human beings would constitute a medically unjustifiable and inherently unsafe experiment, putting at risk the physical well-being of women and their children.

The physical hazards of cloning and genetic manipulation have been amply demonstrated by experience with animals. The vast majority of cloned animals fail to develop normally. Many are miscarried or stillborn. Others are born with serious, sometimes lethal, developmental anomalies, including placental and umbilical cord abnormalities, severe immunological deficiencies, anemia, organ deformities, or retarded development. In some species a "large offspring syndrome" is common. Other cloned animals appear healthy when they are born, but soon die for no apparent reason.

Female animals pregnant with cloned offspring have suffered a variety of problems, including complications resulting from the significantly larger size of the fetuses they are carrying. Some of the animal "surrogate mothers" have died.

There is no convincing medical justification for subjecting women and children to these risks.

PREGNANCY AND CHILD RAISING

The production of cloned or genetically modified babies would involve the creation and manipulation of human embryos outside the body. Providers of fertility services and biotech companies would likely develop professional and economic interests in the modified embryos and fetuses that would not necessarily coincide with the best interests of the women carrying them.

Human cloning and inheritable genetic modification would move decisions about reproduction further away from women, and create new pressures on women's experience of reproduction. Subtle or coercive influence about whether to clone, whom to clone, and which traits to select might be applied by a partner, an insurance company, a doctor, a counselor, a social circle, the fashions of the season, or biotech marketers. Women could find themselves simultaneously losing control of their own pregnancies and childbearing decisions, and subject to vastly increased pressures to produce the "perfect baby."

In this way, the capability to produce cloned and genetically redesigned babies would exert new pressures on women making childbearing decisions, threatening to turn them into "eugenic gatekeepers."

In addition, women carrying cloned or genetically manipulated fetuses would experience the inevitable failures in particularly intimate ways, as miscarriages, stillbirths, and the deaths of their infants. Mothers would shoulder much of the responsibility for any physical problems or psychological difficulties that a cloned or genetically modified child might experience.

REPRODUCTIVE RIGHTS AND THE POLITICS OF ABORTION

Until recently, legislative and policy debates over human cloning in the United States took place almost entirely within the framework of abortion politics. Opposition to cloning was voiced most loudly by opponents of abortion rights for whom the destruction of embryos that human cloning and IGM would entail was a motivating concern.

Misusing the Language of Choice

Many promoters of species-altering procedures have sought to appropriate the language of reproductive rights and freedom of choice. They argue that parents should have the "right" to choose the genetic constitution of their future children—to produce a cloned child who would be a genetic duplicate of another person, or to preselect a child's traits using IGM.

Two books authored by supporters of human species-altering technologies—From Chance to Choice and Children of Choice—exemplify this approach. The websites of two pro-cloning groups, Human Cloning Foundation (http://www.humancloning.org/) and Clone Rights United Front (http://www.clonerights.com/), provide further examples. See also "Human Cloning, Infertility, and Reproductive Freedom" by Mark Eibert, at http://reason.com/opeds/eibert.shtml, which argues that banning cloning would violate a "right to reproduce."

If cloning and genetic "enhancement" are developed and used, they may wind up posing new threats to reproductive rights. In recent years, opponents of abortion rights have increasingly appealed to "fetal rights" to support restrictions on abortion access. Expensive procedures carried out on embryos or fetuses could lead to situations in which the protection of those modified fetuses are pitted against the rights of the women carrying them.

Pro-Choice Opposition to Species-Altering Technologies

Pro-choice forces have begun to respond to claims that altering the genetic make-up of future children would constitute a reproductive right, and to engage the issues raised by human cloning and IGM. An increasing number of reproductive rights groups and pro-choice voices are pointing out that there is an immense difference between ending an unwanted pregnancy and creating a duplicate human or a child with preselected traits.

In summer 2001 more than 100 reproductive rights and women's health leaders and organizations signed a statement calling for Congress to ban cloning. See http://www.ourbodiesourselves.org/clone3.htm.

CHILDREN'S RIGHTS AND WELL-BEING

Human cloning and inheritable genetic modification (IGM) would have grave implications for the physical, psychological, and social well-being of all children.

Physical Hazards

Cloning and IGM would put children at risk of serious genetic and developmental problems. Cloned animals have been affected by placental and umbilical cord abnormalities, severe immunological deficiencies, anemia, organ deformities, and retarded development. In some species a "large offspring syndrome" is common. Other cloned animals appear healthy when they are born but soon die for no apparent reason. [ Technologies >> Human Cloning ]

These developmental problems appear to be the result of reprogramming errors inherent in the cloning process itself. It appears unlikely that a procedure could be developed that would eliminate them. There is no medical justification for knowingly exposing a child to these sorts of risks.

Social and Psychological Effects

Cloned children would be born as genetic near-duplicates of a previously existing person; genetically modified children would be born with preselected traits. They would come into the world expected to look, act, and perform according to the specifications selected and paid for. These expectations would strongly condition the nature of relationships and communications among children and their parents, other adults, and other children.

It would be difficult for parents not to feel disappointed, even "cheated," if a genetically modified child did not express a trait that had been selected and paid for. Unreasonable and unfulfilled parental expectations can certainly flourish in the absence of genetic modification, but expectations grounded in technical claims and expensive procedures would likely be far more pronounced.

Improving the Lives of Children

Dramatic improvements in the lives of children are well within our reach, and require no manipulation of inheritable genes. All of our children would benefit from better health care, cleaner air and water, more healthful food, and improved childcare and educational opportunities. Proposals to genetically redesign children substitute a hubristic technical fix for committed and compassionate social engagement.