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5 - Look at those Muscles, Look at that Butt

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 December 2021

Eben Kirksey
Affiliation:
Deakin University, Victoria
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Summary

It's one thing to write about the global race to genetically modify people; it's another thing to learn how it's done. So I gave it a shot. In 2015, I decided to take a continuing education course for scientists who wanted to use CRISPR in their own research projects. One of my instructors, Rafael Casellas, a beguiling Argentine scientist at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), wasn't shy about his enthusiasm. He claimed that a scientific and medical revolution is coming, whether society is ready or not.

Casellas showed us PowerPoint slides of genetically modified cattle with no horns and beagles edited to be faster and stronger. A slide of a young child with a bad rash—an acute skin inflammation as a result of an allergy to eggs—accompanied pictures of genetically engineered chickens. “If you can't change the humans,” Casellas said, “then change the chickens; they don't complain.” Quickly flipping through pictures in a dizzying survey of creatures that blurred the boundaries of science fiction and fact, he hurried past ethical questions related to animal welfare.

A cartoon video clip from Bloomberg News flashed up on the screen. It depicted a mosquito lounging by a swimming pool, with a palm tree in the background and a drink in hand. An upbeat narrator said: “Right now there is a very special mosquito flying around a lab in California that is carrying a genetic weapon.” This weaponized mosquito was designed to destroy the malaria parasite. The genetically modified insect was being contained in a lab, because the ecological consequences of releasing it were unknown. But there might soon come a time, the narrator claimed, when it will become unethical to keep it inside. This time may come “sooner than you think,” the narrator said. Noting that billions of dollars have been invested in CRISPR enterprises, the clip concludes, “There isn't much time for debate.”

As Casellas continued with his lecture, showing more pictures of genetically modified life-forms, another researcher, Ben Mead, tried to interrupt. Mead wanted to talk about the environmental consequences of releasing mosquitoes with altered DNA. Genetically modified organisms were already producing problems for the environment and endangering human health, he said.

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The Mutant Project
Inside the Global Race to Genetically Modify Humans
, pp. 63 - 74
Publisher: Bristol University Press
Print publication year: 2021

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