Social issues - additional news and reports (March 2007)
LIFE ISSUES
Assisted Reproductive Technologies (ARTs)
Yet another variant of IVF has been announced. Originally developed by the IVF pioneers of the 1970s, Steptoe and Edwards, it has now been tested in Denmark and is called ‘in vitro maturation’ (IVM). It involves collecting undeveloped ova and maturing them in the laboratory before fertilising them. IVM is claimed to produce better success rates than standard IVF, and to be safer and cheaper because it uses less of those high-priced, dangerous ovarian hyperstimulating drugs. IVF - low success, expensive, unsafe? Surely not.
And there is now also a new type of pre-implantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) called pre-implantation genetic haplotyping (PGH). Freddie and Thomas Greenstreet were born at Guy’s Hospital, London in October 2006 after their mother underwent IVF and PGH to screen out any embryos infected with a rare form of cystic fibrosis, from which their five-year-old sister already suffers. Their mother Catherine asserted: ‘They are designer babies, but they were designed for the good of mankind.’ PGH screens embryos for the presence of familial disease haplotypes, as opposed to specific mutations. This means that while PGD identifies the presence or absence of a specific disease-associated mutation in an embryo, PGH can be used where the precise mutation is not known or cannot be identified. So PGH can scan for the presence of a broader genetic ‘signature’, or haplotype, associated with the familial disease gene region. For instance, PGD can detect the single most common causative mutation for cystic fibrosis, but PGH can detect many of the less common variants of the disease.
The most successful (and certainly the richest) IVF practitioner in Britain, Dr Mohamed Taranissi, has been in trouble. He is accused of offering unnecessary treatments and unproven tests, operating a clinic without the required HFEA licence, encouraging multiple births and openly expressing contempt for the HFEA and its procedures. The BBC’s Panorama programme, the police and the HFEA have all been chasing him. The conclusion of these investigations is awaited.
Because ARTs are unnatural in both ethics and practice, the outcomes will sometimes be bizarre, even abnormal. The above are just two. These aberrations are worth noting because the unnatural has a habit of becoming accepted as natural, and therefore they may alert us to what may soon become more commonplace ethical dilemmas.
Yet another dubious world record has been broken. Carmela Bousada, a 67-year-old Spaniard gave birth to twins in December 2006 and thereby became the world’s oldest mother. OK, she had to lie about her age at the Pacific Fertility Centre in Los Angeles. OK, the HFEA does not think it could happen in the UK. OK, it involved buying sperm and ova. OK she had to sell her house to pay for the treatment. OK, it is unnatural – beyond the normal limits of childbearing. OK, she is now looking for a younger husband. OK, the episode will probably shorten her life expectancy. OK, her family has since turned against her. OK ….., but is it all OK?
Goodbye, President Bush?
Politicians come and go – well, some just hang around for too long. Certainly, George Bush now appears to have lost his bioethical oomph. The US Senate and the House have recently come under the control of pro-choice Democrats. With that move, the opportunities to implement pro-life legislation have been greatly diminished. Sure, Bush has accomplished some good on the pro-life front, in both appointments and legal implementation. And he does still retain the presidential veto. But he has also disappointed. The high hopes of recent years have undoubtedly receded. The lesson – ‘It is better to take refuge in the LORD than to trust in man [Psalm 118:8].
EDUCATION ISSUES
Faith Schools No Better than Secular Schools!
Faith primary schools make little difference to children’s future prospects, government-funded research shows. A report by Dr Stephen Gibbons and Olmo Silva from the Centre for the Economics of Education, an independent research centre funded at the London School of Economics (LSE) by the Department for Education and Skills (DfES) indicates that attending a faith primary school will add just 0.0042 per cent to their pay as an adult - equivalent to an extra £1.25 a year on the average London salary of £29,744.
Dr Gibbons said results achieved by children in national tests taken at age 11 were only one per cent better in the case of faith school pupils. The report seeks to address the question of whether or not pupils really benefit from attending a faith school rather than a secular school, or whether faith schools simply attract and admit high-ability children with better family backgrounds.
The report introduces a new method of accounting for the differences in backgrounds between pupils attending faith schools and those attending secular schools. The results appear consistent with those from the US that indicate that it is parental factors rather than the school attended that determine a child’s academic success. The US study found that children of parents who didn’t get into a school of their choice achieved just as well as those who did.
The report also acknowledges that there may be other impacts from attending faith schools, on staying-on rates and child well-being for example, that are outside the scope of the study. This observation lies buried on page 32 of the 58-page report and appeared to go unnoticed in reports in the major press where the study is portrayed as putting pressure on the government to curb its enthusiasm for faith schools. Perhaps the biggest message from this report is that a governmental policy which measures educational success in passes and grades achieved in particular types of examinations, or in potential earnings, may well flounder.
King Fahad Academy
A Saudi-funded Islamic school says it is removing from text books controversial passages which allegedly brand other faiths as “worthless”. The controversy centres on the use of textbooks produced by the Saudi Ministry of Education. A textbook dated 2005/2006 allegedly asks the reader to “give examples of worthless religions… such as Judaism, Christianity, idol worship and others”. In another textbook for 12 and 13-year-olds, dated 2004/2005, the author allegedly says that a Koranic verse, which talks of turning people into monkeys and pigs, is about Jews and Christians. The author quotes an early Islamic scholar as saying: “The monkeys are the Jews. And the pigs, they are the Christian infidels at Jesus’s table.”
The reaction of Newsnight’s Jeremy Paxman to the section of the book allegedly asking the reader to “explain that those who die without adhering to Islam will go to hellfire” is of note. Paxman described this as incompatible with tolerance and respect for all religions.
DISABILITY ISSUES
Ashley X and the stunting of growth
Ashley X is a nine-year-old American girl with profound and multiple learning disabilities. Her parents have taken the decision to prevent her from developing and to keep her the size of a child. Her parents insist that they done this to give her a better quality of life – not to make caring for her more convenient.
They have called the intervention ‘Ashley Treatment’. This consists of a two-and-a-half year course of oestrogen, a hysterectomy and the removal of her breast buds. Her parents say that Ashley’s mental age will never develop beyond three months, and that the treatment means she can remain involved in family life.
The case has inevitably, and quite rightly, prompted a storm of protest from disability organisations and Christian groups. The actions of Ashley’s parents have been deemed an attack on her rights as a child and a flagrant breach of parental trust and responsibility.
Leroy Binns, a peer advocate for people with profound and multiple learning disabilities said: “I don’t think what Ashley’s parents are doing is fair on her – it is taking away her human rights. It’s not fair on her to stay the same for ever and not go through the changes that others do.”
David Congdon, of Mencap, has said: “Ashley was forced to endure major surgery and to do this to a young girl was abhorrent. It would have been condemned if Ashley had not been disabled. I understand parents’ concerns about how they will be able to care for their children as they get older. No-one is underestimating the challenges they face, but the answer is that they must be provided with the support to do so.”
Jane Myers, the mother of Jess, a daughter with profound disabilities, believes the family are misguided. How could they deny their child the right to personhood in all its stages.
The actions of Ashley’s parents, with the advice and support of their doctors, is a disturbing example of the human desire to be in control of all circumstances and to assert personal rights above those of another individual.
Landmark case for carers
The case of Sharon Coleman is therefore of considerable interest to those who are concerned about this social inequality. Ms Coleman, who cares for her disabled son Oliver, won the right for an unfair treatment claim against her employers. The landmark case could provide protection for millions of unpaid carers. It centres on the effect of EU Equal Treatment laws on UK disability discrimination law.
Although Ms Coleman is not disabled herself, her lawyers argue that the EU laws protect her from unfair treatment because of her association with a disabled person. Ms Coleman, who worked as a legal secretary, claims her employer, London solicitors Attridge Law, unfairly treated her. She says she was described as lazy when wanting to take time off to care for her son. She also claims her manager made insulting and derogatory remarks about her son. These actions, she says, forced her to resign. The case will be presented before the European Court of Justice later in the year.
A spokesperson for the Disability Rights Commission, which is supporting Ms Coleman, said: “Without providing protection from discrimination for carers and without family and employment policies that enable flexible working, many more British families will reach breaking point.
Students with learning disabilities
Nearly 3,000 of the 20,000 adult students with learning disabilities have lost their college places as a result of cuts being made by Local Education Authorities.
The Government minister for life-long learning, Bill Rammell, claims that the cuts are only of inadequate and poorly-performing courses, and that the majority of students on these courses have been offered better alternatives.
However evidence from the families of those with a learning disability indicates that this is not the case. They claim that the Learning and Skills Council are closing courses that don’t lead to qualifications without regard for the social benefits of these courses for those with a learning disability.
Emphasising courses that focus on work and independent living skills and have a definite economic outcome is disadvantaging those with a learning disability. There ought to be courses providing the skill and ability to participate in community and a daily social experience. It should not be a requirement of a pottery course that those who participate must progress to being a potter. The opportunity of working with a roomful of peers to achieve a satisfying and enriching experience ought not to be penalised.
The government claims that social care provision and day care centres are a suitable alternative to college courses. However, the families say that the college courses do not have a stigma attached to them and those who participate feel less marginalised.
Testing Teaching Approaches
Professor Mark Walport, director of the Wellcome Trust, the UK’s largest independent funder of bio-medical research, is advocating that approaches to education should be rigorously tested before being introduced into schools.
This would make it possible for the achievements of, say, independent state schools with a strong, clear Christian ethos to be meaningfully and systematically compared with those of similar schools with a non-religious, possibly atheistic, ethos. Comparisons of this type already take place but are often controversial because the many variables that affect the results are not sufficiently controlled or understood.
Professor Walport believes new ideas to improve teaching and learning should be subject to the kind of testing followed, for instance, when assessing new drugs. This could involve, for example, a new educational approach being piloted in one or more schools, with close control and measurement of its circumstances, the outcomes then being carefully compared with those of similar groups of children in other schools where the approach was not implemented.
Some believe it unethical to experiment on children in this way, but this argument is weakened by the fact that the education system is already rife with random experimentation on a national scale, subjecting teachers and children to new approaches, generally without any clear idea of the outcomes.
However, potential difficulties have been outlined by Professor Alan Smithers, director of the Centre for Education and Employment Research at the University of Buckingham, who pointed to the problems of differentiating between the many factors that affect educational success. He said, “…the findings of [educational] research are rarely strong enough to overturn prior conceptions.” This seems to reinforce the view that a good education depends more on the application of core principles and approaches than sophisticated educational theories.
Civil Partnership Act 2004 – European Court decision
Two elderly sisters from Wiltshire, aged 88 and 81, whom the Act does not allow to become civil partners, took their case to the European Court of Human Rights, where on 12 December 2006 it was announced that judges had, by a 4-3 majority, rejected their claim of unlawful discrimination. According to The Daily Telegraph on 13 December 2006, the sisters are considering an appeal.
Parliament approves Sexual Orientation Regulations
The Equality Act (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2007 will come into effect on 30 April following approval in the House of Commons and the House of Lords on 21 March 2007.
As a consequence of these Regulations it will be legal for an individual Christian to believe that same-sex relationships are sinful, but illegal to conduct his or her life in a way which is entirely consistent with those beliefs. In other words, the government is advocating hypocrisy as the approved course of action under these Regulations.
The High Court in Belfast is to undertake a judicial review of the Northern Ireland SORs in June this year, and the outcome of that case could affect the SORs throughout ther United Kingdom.
Super-casino plan shudders to a halt
The Casino Advisory Panel set up under the Act chose Manchester as the venue for the one super-casino which this Act permits. The Panel has also selected venues for eight medium-sized and eight small casinos.
However these proposals have now ground to a halt following the government’s defeat in the House of Lords on 28 March 2007 on the secondary legislation which would have brought the plans to fruition.
Immediately following the defeat, Tessa Jowell, Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, announced that the government would reflect on the way forward and would announce in due course what it intended to do.
While trumpeting the employment and regeneration benefits of casinos, the government had appeared to be giving too little serious attention to the misery which will be caused to thousands of households as a result of gambling addiction and gambling being made too easy, not only in connection with casinos, but more widely. At the same time the government is compounding this problem by relaxing some advertising restrictions.
Contributors to the above material: Rod Badams, Peter Fearnley (education), Dr John Ling (life issues), Gerald Tanner (disability)
Published by Affinity Social Issues Team, c/o Rod Badams (editor), tel. 01858 411554. Email:
