Biopirates and the poor.The promise to cure disease through human genetic engineering has moved faster on Wall Street and in the media than in basic scientific knowledge of how genes work and how genetic manipulation affects whole organisms as well as their relationships with other organisms. Within a few weeks the "alphabet" of the "Book of Life" shrank from 100,000 to 30,000; this is just one indicator of the ocean of ignorance in which the island of human genetic engineering is floating. The three major concerns arising from human genetic engineering are biopiracy bi·o·pi·ra·cy n. The commercial development of naturally occurring biological materials, such as plant substances or genetic cell lines, by a technologically advanced country or organization without fair compensation to the peoples or nations in , the transformation of socially defined traits into biologically defined ones, and the issue of privacy. Across the world, indigenous communities are outraged at biopiracy of genes and genetic material. The recent case of collection of blood samples from the Naga naga In Hindu and Buddhist mythology, a semidivine being, half human and half serpent. Nagas can assume either wholly human or wholly serpentine form. They live in an underground kingdom filled with beautiful palaces that are adorned with gems. tribe in northeast India is just another example of gene piracy at the human level. Such piracy can even happen in the heart of rich industrial society, as shown by the case in which University of California The University of California has a combined student body of more than 191,000 students, over 1,340,000 living alumni, and a combined systemwide and campus endowment of just over $7.3 billion (8th largest in the United States). scientists patented the genes of a cancer patient, John Moore, without his knowledge. What is called a deficiency--mental, physical, or other--is socially defined. For example, the perverse world order of globalization globalization Process by which the experience of everyday life, marked by the diffusion of commodities and ideas, is becoming standardized around the world. Factors that have contributed to globalization include increasingly sophisticated communications and transportation dictated by commerce, greed, and profits regularly treats women, children, and poor people as inferiors. Without strong democracy and true transparency, this kind of discrimination can be used to justify human genetic manipulation, manifested in eugenics eugenics (y  jĕn`ĭks), study of human genetics and of methods to improve the inherited characteristics, physical and mental, of the human race. programs.
Human genetic engineering also raises major issues about the erosion of privacy and handing people's control over their own destiny to others, such as insurance companies, pharmaceutical companies, and police states, which could combine to share genetic data without the consent and participation of the persons concerned. Vandana Shiva is a physicist and environmental activist and is director of the Research Foundation for Science, Technology, and Ecology in Uttar Pradesh, India. Her books include Water Wars: Privatization privatization: see nationalization. privatization Transfer of government services or assets to the private sector. State-owned assets may be sold to private owners, or statutory restrictions on competition between privately and publicly owned , Pollution, and Profit (South End Press, 2002) and Stolen Harvest: The Hijacking hijacking Crime of seizing possession or control of a vehicle from another by force or threat of force. Although by the late 20th century hijacking most frequently involved the seizure of an airplane and its forcible diversion to destinations chosen by the air pirates, when of the Global Food Supply (South End Press, 2000). |
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