History, Eugenics and Genetics

Personal Genetics Education Project (pgEd)Harvard Medical School - Wu Laboratory

www.pged.org

The Beery twins, Noah and Alexis

http://the-scientist.com/author/lucy-reading/ (2011)

Oxford Nanopore MinION

Genome sequencing technology

Fanconi anemia (disorder of DNA repair)

Cure: PGD, umbilical cord bloodstem cells

http://tvnoviny.sk/sekcia/spravy/zahranicne/vo-francuzsku-sa-narodilo-prve-dizajnerske-dieta.html

Molly and Adam Nash

Schwartz 2011 Jewish News

Preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD)

Fatal Transplants Adultillness

Gender Strength &Intelligence

Men

Women

Public attitudes regarding the use of PGD

http://www.dnapolicy.org/resources/2006_Hudson_PGD_public_policy_and_public_attitudes.pdf

Big idea: Improving society and

humanity via selective breeding and sterilization.

First half of the 20th century.

State and Federal laws addressing issues ranging from

immigration to mandatory sterilization.

Burlington Free Press, January 24, 1925, p. 1.

American eugenics movement

Photo by Jacob Riis, courtesy of the Museum of the City of New York

http://www.eugenicsarchive.org/eugenics/view_image.pl?id=348

Georgia State Fair 1924

http://news.wustl.edu/news/Pages/792.aspx

“Fitter Family” contests: 1920s – 1940s

Laws Against Interracial Marriage

http://www.eugenicsarchive.org/html/eugenics/static/images/958.html

http://www.saponitown.com/eugenics-carrie-buck/eugenics-carrie-buck.htm

Carrie Buck

http://www.hsl.virginia.edu/historical/eugenics/

“...society can prevent those who are manifestly unfit from continuing their kind...

Three generations of imbeciles are enough.”

Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.

Raymond PearlEugenics preaching is “contrary to the best established facts of genetical science.”

Carnegie Institution Visiting Committee, 1935: Most of the ERO’s work was without scientific merit and it should cease sponsorship of programs in immigration restriction, sterilization, and race betterment.

http://www.dnalc.org/

“We do not stand alone”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Wir_stehen_nicht_allein.jpg

Nuremberg Code4 of the 10 directives for Human Subjects Research

1. The voluntary consent of the human subject is absolutely essential… 

2. The experiment should be such as to yield fruitful results for the good of society, … 

4. The experiment should be so conducted as to avoid all unnecessary physical and mental suffering and injury.

9. During the course of the experiment the human subject should be at liberty to bring the experiment to an end…

http://www.wfae.org/

Pamphlet from the Human Betterment Leagueof North Carolina – 1950

http://rt.com/usa/news/north-carolina-eugenics-vote-372/

Los Angeles Times

Protests against forced sterilization

http://abcnews.go.com

Elaine Riddick –sterilized without her knowledge at the age of 14

North Carolina

•Eugenic sterilization law enacted February 18, 1929.•Sterilization suitable for “mentally defective persons.”•“The 7,600 victims of the program, which was dissolved in 1977, were largely women and disproportionately members of minorities.” (New York Times).•Any person (e.g., a neighbor) could request someone be sterilized, which would then be considered by a state sterilization board.•After 10 years of debate, the NC legislature passed a budget to provide $10 million to victims. (As of 2013, roughly 200 victims have come forward, so each would receive about $50,000.)•This is the first time reparations have been granted to victims of eugenic sterilization.

Presidential Commission on Bioethical Issues

http://www.bioethics.gov/