Sir, - Senator Mary Henry (April 14th), replying to my letter of April 8th, refers to her Private Member's Bill on regulation of Assisted Human Reproduction (shortly to be debated in the Seanad). Any move to provide proper regulation in this area is welcome, and her proposal of an advisory committee to deal with new technology in this area is sensible. I would, however, take issue with one point raised by Senator Henry. Legislation in this area should not avoid dealing with the technology; basic principles need to be established, and an advisory committee can assess new developments within this framework.
There is no scientific or other reason to describe embryos produced by in-vitro fertilisation (IVF) as anything other than human individuals. Any legislation in the area should protect their fundamental rights as human beings. So they should not be discarded, used for research, or used to grow spare body parts. All of these abuses are becoming commonplace in many countries. Any bill which doesn't deal clearly with this issue will be defective. I repeat the question posed in my previous letter: has the present Government the vision and the courage to take the appropriate decisions now in relation to IVF, embryo freezing, and the use of embryos in research, to prevent serious problems, involving destruction of human individuals, in the future? - Yours, etc., Martin Clynes,
Professor of Biotechnology, Dublin City University, Dublin 9.