News

The quest to create gene-edited babies gets a reboot

By Rob Stein, NPR [cites CGS' Katie Hasson] | 08.06.2025

A Chinese scientist horrified the world in 2018 when he revealed he had secretly engineered the birth of the world's first gene-edited babies.

His work was reviled as reckless and unethical because, among other reasons, gene-editing was so new...

Genetic Selection

Baby Bonuses and Motherhood Medals: Why We Shouldn’t Trust the Pronatalist Movement

By Staff, National Women's Law Center | 08.13.2025

INTRODUCTION

Baby bonuses. Motherhood medals. Fertility tracking. You may have heard of these policy proposals as solutions from the Trump administration to help encourage women to have more children.

Besides falling short of ensuring that people have what they need...

Human Genetic Modification

We Don’t Know if the Babies Born From Mitochondrial Replacement Therapy Will Still Develop Mitochondrial Disease

By Katherine Drabiak, Journal of Medical Ethics Forum | 08.07.2025

Adapted from Mitochondrial DNA at
National Human Genome Research Institute

Recently, media outlets around the world have been reporting on...

Assisted Reproduction

Can doctors test embryos for autism? And should they?

By Brittany Luse, Liam McBain, and Neena Pathak, NPR [cites CGS' Katie Hasson] | 05.28.2025

A newly available kind of genetic testing, called polygenic embryo screening, promises to screen for conditions that can include cancer...

Genetic Selection

Synthetic Genetic Evolution

By Ruth Williams, The Scientist | 04.19.2012
Synthetic genetic polymers, broadly referred to as XNAs, can replicate and evolve just like their naturally occurring counterparts, DNA and...
Synthetic Biology

IVF Babies May Face Later Cardiac Risks

By Chris Kaiser, MedPage Today | 04.19.2012
Children conceived using assisted reproductive technology, including in vitro fertilization, may be at risk for premature cardiovascular disease, a small...
Assisted Reproduction

Baby Sex Selection Ad Targets Indo-Canadians

By Annie Burns-Pieper, CBC News | 04.17.2012

A Washington-based reproductive clinic is advertising gender selection services in a Canadian newspaper that targets South Asian communities, CBC News...

Eugenics

Studying Bioethics at Scandal-Plagued Universities

By Carl Elliott, The Chronicle of Higher Education | 04.17.2012
Why should students study bioethics at a university plagued with bioethical scandals? That’s the uncomfortable question here in Minnesota, where...
Bioethics

Parents Can Have a Duty to Use IVF, say Bioethicists

By Michael Cook, BioEdge | 04.17.2012
When two Italian-Australian utilitarian bioethicists declared in the Journal of Medical Ethics that infanticide (or after-birth abortion) was morally permissible...
Bioethics

UK Aid Helps to Fund Forced Sterilisation of India's Poor

By Gethin Chamberlain, Guardian | 04.14.2012
Tens of millions of pounds of UK aid money have been spent on a programme that has forcibly sterilised Indian...
Other Countries

Critics of California Stem-Cell Agency Address Institute of Medicine Panel

By Erika Check Hayden, Nature News Blog | 04.13.2012
A committee convened by the US Institute of Medicine (IOM) heard testimony on 10 April about shortcomings of the San...
Stem Cells

Texas Board Approves Rules on Use of Stem Cells

By Minjae Park, New York Times | 04.13.2012
AUSTIN, Tex. — The Texas Medical Board on Friday approved controversial new rules on the use of adult stem cells...
Stem Cells