Search Salon

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Recently in Salon Technology

How the Web was almost won
Just how close did we come to a Net ruled by Microsoft? The "server wars" show a grim counterpart to the browser wars.
By Tim O'Reilly
[11/16/99]

Technology: View from the top
The accidental entertainer
Rob Burgess wasn't chasing cartoons -- but with Macromedia's Flash and Shockwave enabling a faux broadband experience, he's suddenly tight with Stan Lee.
By John Geirland
[11/15/99]

Direct mail double cross?
A fight over opt-in marketing has anti-spam activists crying foul.
By Deborah Scoblionkov
[11/12/99]

You're_a_Loser.com
Behind (and beneath) every Internet gazillionaire is an army of downtrodden "NetSlaves."
By Janelle Brown
[11/11/99]

The consumer's always wrong
Why else would visitors to consumer rating sites like Deja.com rank Rolling Rock the second-best beer and Alan Keyes the top presidential candidate?
By Mark Gimein
[11/10/99]

Complete archives for Technology

- - - - - - - - - - - -

- - - - - - - - - - - -

- - - - - - - - - - - -

If you scoff at the notion that a child's future academic prowess was once thought to be determined by the fact that his or her grandfather was a drunkard, then consider that today we don't even flinch at the idea of controlling our own procreation. In fact, we expect to pay a lot of money to engineer the "perfect baby." Witness the advertisement placed in the student newspapers of Ivy League schools by an infertile San Diego couple last year. The ad offered $50,000 to college-aged women in exchange for their eggs. The couple, by selecting to advertise only to the Ivy League, was clearly looking for a particular kind of woman's eggs, and they were very specific: Potential donors had to be at least 5-foot-10, possess a combined SAT score of 1400 or higher, and show some athletic prowess.

Then there's the more recent case of Ron Harris, the Arabian horse breeder and fashion photographer who reportedly opened up a Web site for the purpose of auctioning off eggs and sperm of fashion models to the highest bidders. The price of admission to this little exercise is a fee of 20 percent of a the final bid on egg or sperm, and for that, you have the comfort of knowing that, "our striving reflects the determination to pass every advantage possible along to our descendants."

"I guess the question I ask about this is why buy such a specific egg," posits Paul Lombardo, professor at the Institute of Law, Psychiatry and Public Policy at the University of Virginia and a leading scholar of the Vivian Buck case. "I understand that couples are infertile, but [through ads like this], they're not just looking to have a baby, they're looking to have a special baby with special features they've picked out."

Why buy a specific egg? Don't we want the best for our children? Developments in reproductive and genetic science coupled with the age-old desire to give our children every advantage possible has led us to a point where we feel we are more responsible for our offspring at an earlier age -- even before we conceive them. Of course, it's common knowledge that smoking and drinking alcohol can harm a developing baby, and a lot of women are aware that taking folic acid before and during a pregnancy decreases the chances of birth defects; these are the eat-your-broccoli type measures that any woman can take. But where we begin to cross the line from common-sense health choices to scientific control comes with procedures like prenatal genetic tests.

Prenatal genetic screening is designed to look for specific diseases such as Down syndrome and is recommended to women whom doctors determine to be "at risk." Just who is "at risk" is a decision that is made on based on results of preliminary blood tests and anecdotal and demographic information a pregnant woman gives her doctor. A woman's race, age and the diseases that have existed in her family and that of her mate's are among the facts used to determine the risks of producing a baby with a disease or disability. For example, risks for certain inherited diseases like Tay Sachs or sickle-cell anemia vary depending upon the race of a woman and her mate. So if a woman or her mate are Jewish, then she is likely to be screened for Tay Sachs.

The discussion between doctor and patient regarding prenatal tests often start off with the open-ended question: How do you feel about genetic testing? In the abstract, who could quibble with having more information about her developing baby? But when you're pregnant, wearing nothing but a hospital gown, and lying with legs agape on an examination table, this question can stir panic. That panic comes from the implicit message delivered by doctors when they advise patients to have these tests: Should the baby turn out to carry a disease or defect, intervention -- in the form of in utero surgery or even abortion -- is often advised.

With prenatal genetic testing comes a small chance of triggering a miscarriage. At the same time, certain results, like tests for cystic fibrosis, can generate more questions than answers. Cystic fibrosis, a fatal, inherited illness where the body produces large amounts of abnormally thick mucus that accumulates in the lungs and intestines, is known to biologists as a single-gene disease. This means that having the gene would mean that someone would have the disease. But someone who carries the gene for the disease might never show signs of cystic fibrosis. That's because the genes themselves don't bring on the disease, says Garland Allen, a professor of biology at the Washington University St. Louis. The expression of the genes depend on other factors such as environmental triggers, Allen says.

Such ambiguities are not generally part of the discussion when doctors steer their patients toward having these tests. If you waver when asked the general, "How do you feel about testing?" question, then the doctor might ask, "What if," as in, "What if the baby has Down syndrome?" And if you're still waffling, and if you happen to have a child already, you might be asked, "What about your child? How will a Down baby affect your family?" This conversation hits a pregnant woman in her most vulnerable spot -- her heartfelt concern for the health of her developing baby and the overall well-being of her family. And some doctors make their opinions about this clear: To undergo the tests is to fulfill a duty to do all that is possible to ensure a baby is healthy; to refuse the tests is to shirk responsibility.

Next page | Every seven minutes a high-grade baby is born