I would like to comment on the very interesting article Welcomed Hopes For IVF Baby Couples (January 28) on the new techniques to improve success in IVF.

Human life cannot be disposed of on a whim- Michael Asciak, Birkirkara

It is very interesting that the success rate for transferred embryos in IVF is increased if the embryos are genetically tested before being transferred to the uterus. This echoes the same results with genetically screening ova before being fertilised in vitro for eventual transfer to the uterus. The big difference is that with the genetic screening and selection of ova, the lower grade ova are disposed of unproblematically. With the genetic screening of embryos, what is one to do with the lower grade embryos? The only options are pouring them down the sink, letting them die or selling them for research.

Considering that these embryos are the early stages of the human organism it becomes obvious that this particular form of pre-implantation genetic diagnosis (PIGD) is only another word for eugenics. Eugenics is the selection of human individuals on their physical or genetic characteristics.

In the same issue, The Times reported that Denmark is the first country to be free from Down’s Syndrome babies. Although that is good in itself, one must look at the means by which this is achieved. I suppose that PIGD and selective abortion have been the tools used.

It seems that for many people today the new maxim in science research is that the ends justify the means even when the means are quite visibly the destruction of defenceless human lives. Unfortunately science without ethics can lead us up corridors that we should not really venture in.

Is today’s brave new world, achieving quietly what the Nazis failed to achieve during the Holocaust? Human life cannot be disposed of on a whim. Medical progress is a very good thing. Medical progress that is effectively inhuman is not.