Argumentative Essay On Gene Therapy

Gene therapy has been around for quite some time, where the earliest trial had occurred to a four-year-old girl back in 1990 at the NIH Clinical Center. She had possessed ADA deficiency a disease that target the body's immune system, leaving it defenseless from foreign invaders. White blood cells were taken out of her body and the genes that make adenosine deaminase were inserted into them and then reinserted back into her body. Gene therapy spans farther back to 1985 when it was first introduced into modern medicine by Drs. W. French Anderson and Michael Blaese. The process behind Gene Therapy is an experimental technique that uses genes in order to treat or prevent diseases. It is designed to introduce genetic material into cells to compensate for abnormal genes, a new gene is injected into an adenovirus vector, which is used to introduce the modified DNA into a human cell. If the treatment is successful, the new gene will make a functional protein. A

Before it can be perfected, several studies have been shown that there have been serious health risks, such as toxicity, inflammation and cancer, since the technique is relatively new it, medical researchers and regulatory agencies are working to ensure the that gene therapy is a safe procedure. The ethical background on gene therapy is harshly surrounded around on things such as high cost and affordability depending on the severity of the disease and if only the wealthy will be able to afford the treatment, another is who decides which traits are normal and which constitute a disability or disorder. The biggest controversy is if people should be allowed to use gene therapy to enhance basic human traits such as height, intelligence, or athletic