One might take the view that 40 years of life before the onset of Huntington’s disease or breast cancer is better than no life at all. But if we take that into account, should we not also take into consideration the life of the child who the parents would have had, if they had been able to use prenatal diagnosis and be sure of having a child who does not carry the gene for the disease?
那么在这项法案背后体现了一种什么思维呢？有人可能会想，如果能在亨廷顿舞蹈症或者乳癌之前有40年命总比连活都没活过要好。但如果我们考虑了这一点，那么是否也要考虑到，父母利用胎儿/胚胎基因检测技术去确保生下一个不携带廷顿舞蹈症基因的孩子，这个孩子不也是一条生命？这个孩子显然会有有更美好的人生，而当我们可以在如此截然不同的生命前景中做出选择——并且可以在胚胎或者胎儿出现任何迹象之前就可以做决定——那么我们是不是应该选择前景更美好的孩子？