Naslov
Ethical challenges in the upcoming era of environmental and ecological engineering for public health reasons

Autori
Čartolovni, Anto

Vrsta, podvrsta i kategorija rada
Sažeci sa skupova, neobjavljeni rad, znanstveni

Skup
30th European Conference on Philosophy of Medicine and Health Care

Mjesto i datum
Zagreb, Hrvatska, 17.08.2016. - 20.08.2016

Vrsta sudjelovanja
Predavanje

Vrsta recenzije
Međunarodna recenzija

Ključne riječi
gene drive, javno zdravstvo, ekološko i okolišno inženjerstvo
(gene drives, public health, ecological and environmental engineering)

Sažetak
Society stands in front of one of the major breakthroughs in gene editing technologies CRISPR Cas9, which, for the first time, enabled scientists to precisely cut DNA molecules that can be exploited to insert other genes or explicitly modify the nucleotide sequence at the cut sites. This new scientific breakthrough opened up the possibility for a new perspective within synthetic biology enabling the realization of the gene drive technology, which are in fact engineered and designed genes that can break typical inheritance rules and get passed to almost all of the carrier’s offspring. The recent challenges from the public health perspective set out by the spreading of the Zika Virus indicated the necessity of taking into consideration as one of the measures for the eradication of the Zika virus the use of gene drive technologies on mosquitoes. Therefore, this gene editing and gene drive technology have become powerful tools for ecological and environmental engineering, through which a human can manipulate his surrounding adjusting it to himself and directly mastering the evolution and ecosystem because of numerous reasons and not only public health reasons. Within the human health domain, the gene drives might help in eradicating insect-borne diseases such as malaria, dengue, yellow fever and lately Zika virus. One of the ethical challenges caused recently by the spread of the Zika Virus is the implementation of such technologies without proper field trials and adequate risk assessment for a responsible implementation. Unfortunately, these challenges are mostly covered under the coercive and nudging industry politics that receives above all the compassionate use in these epidemic situations. Furthermore, lack of the actual knowledge of risk management and containment associated with different gene drives decrease our ability to adequate control the spread out of these gene drives. From the technical point of view, the advantage of this technology is that it is reversible, meaning that the changes inserted with one gene drive in a population might be reversed back with the other gene drive. Moreover, in theory, this new form of gene engineering has been foreseen for the targeted populations (e.g. mosquitoes), but it remains to see the reliability of these gene drives on how they are going to stay only within these target populations without spreading out to non-target or related species through e.g. cross-breeding, which may cause unintended ecological consequences and even species extinction. In this ethical discussion is not the question whether the priority should be given to the environment or the public health, but do we need to rush into such decisions and change the entire ecological system at the moment when we do not completely understand the side-effects of the actual technology or we should use other methods for fighting and eradicating these diseases. However, the issues of ecological engineering are not only a matter of scientific or industry assessment of positive and optimistic impacts, as it has recently been presented, but it is also an issue of community engagement through transparent, informed and fully inclusive public discussions.

Izvorni jezik
Engleski

Znanstvena područja
Kliničke medicinske znanosti, Javno zdravstvo i zdravstvena zaštita, Filozofija

POVEZANOST RADA