Down's Symptoms May Be Treatable In the Womb 170
missb writes "US researchers have found that prenatal treatment for Down syndrome works in mice. This raises the possibility that a pregnant woman who knows her unborn child has Down syndrome might be able to forestall some of the symptoms before giving birth. When fetal mouse pups that had a syndrome similar to Down's were treated with nerve-protecting chemicals, some of the developmental delays that are part of the condition — such as motor and sensory abilities — were removed."
Not quite comprehending (Score:2)
I was looking for some sense that knowledge of the condition might produce some automatic results from the mother's body. But, that was before I realised it was impossible to communicate with mice. Atleast, without a babelfish.
Good news everyone! (Score:5, Funny)
US researchers have found that prenatal treatment for Down syndrome works in mice.
Today is a happy day for all mousekind!
Re:Good news everyone! (Score:5, Funny)
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Dammit, he could have been Dr. Mickey Mouse =(
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Disabled does not mean "Better off Dead". (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Suck em out (Score:5, Interesting)
Isn't an abortion a lot cheaper? I mean, with these genetic misfits being somehow a part of society, we could be doing some damage to our gene pool.
Erm, in case your remark isn't facetious: individuals with Down's Syndrome are typically sterile.
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Isn't an abortion a lot cheaper? I mean, with these genetic misfits being somehow a part of society, we could be doing some damage to our gene pool.
Erm, in case your remark isn't facetious: individuals with Down's Syndrome are typically sterile.
I'm not joking/flaming here but I always wondered about people with glasses - years ago they would have died of hunger unless someone took pity on them. They'd have struggled gathering food or making tools, etc.. Yet it seems those with poor eyesight amount to about 95% of the geek genepool. Look around at your next LUG meeting / Math lecture / whatever ...
Shouldn't we be letting poor traits like bad eyesight die out if we wish for the race to survive?
Nice troll, but... (Score:2)
... as Down's syndrome people seldom reproduce, no, we're not doing damage to the gene pool.
Some interesting questions might be asked about the ability of Down's syndrome sufferers to look after themselves after their parents have died, and who does it if they can't. I don't know the answers, though.
Re:Nice troll, but... (Score:5, Insightful)
As a general rule their intellectual development will freeze at around the level of a 4th or 5th grader, but they are capable of the emotional maturity and ability to complete of domestic tasks to keep themselves alive. They can often do quite well in a sharehouse/hostel kind of environment with a part-time carer or health professional available to help them with complex tasks or issues. Complete independence is unlikely (although possible in some cases) but they're not helpless.
Re:Nice troll, but... (Score:4, Interesting)
A friend told me about a young man with Downs syndrome who is adept at arithmetic. He lives alone and works as an accountant. Not bad at all for someone with his condition. If only us "normal" people all had the winning attitude and supportive family this man has...
Chris Burke (Score:4, Interesting)
A friend told me about a young man with Downs syndrome who is adept at arithmetic. He lives alone and works as an accountant. Not bad at all for someone with his condition.
Ever heard of Chris Burke [wikipedia.org]? Quite a lot of people would be jealous of accomplishments like that.
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A friend told me about a young man with Downs syndrome who is adept at arithmetic. He lives alone and works as an accountant. Not bad at all for someone with his condition. If only us "normal" people all had the winning attitude and supportive family this man has...
Whatever you do, don't give out his name - this place is lousy with eugenicists. They don't yet realize the trick is they're less than perfect themselves and will eventually be culled.
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It's uncommon but they can reproduce.
I think the nature of Down's though is that they seldom outlive their parents - life expectancy is much lower.
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It's uncommon but they can reproduce.
I think the nature of Down's though is that they seldom outlive their parents - life expectancy is much lower.
That was true a few years ago but now life expectancy of DS is around 50. Mean life expectancy in DS has also historically been skewed by the large number of people with Down syndrome dying in childhood. Since the average age of parents of DS children is about 30-35, this means nowadays that most DS children will outlive their parents, at least they will outlive the time where theire parents can care for them.
Having said that, DS often only confers a mild cognitive impairment. Also most of us without D
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I think the point of this is more in figuring out how to, step by step, intercept and prevent the syndrome entirely.
Sure, abortion prevents it as well. But the option to defeat the syndrome during development and not have it expressed at all in a living person would be better.
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Down's is caused by an extra chromosome, it's impossible to defeat the syndrome during development without modifying the genetic code of every cell in the body.
Abortion should be an option for those who agree with it, but those who don't and who belong to high-risk groups (women in their late forties who do not agree with contraception either) need to understand that they are playing Russian roulette, which is fitting if they can see Russia from their house.
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it's impossible to defeat the syndrome during development without modifying the genetic code of every cell in the body.
So what you're saying is, it might be easier when the body consists of fewer cells?
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> So what you're saying is, it might be easier when the body consists of fewer cells?
It will be easier but still impossible. You would have to remove a complete choromose from every cell in the body. We cannot even remove a single chromosome from a cell, by the time it is possible to diagnose downs syndrome, there are millions/billions of cells already. Even if such a treatment were possible (and I daresay this will not happen during our lifetimes), it would have all kinds of risks, and it would probably
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Aah, I love rephrased witty comments!
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Aah, I love it when everyone piles onto a loosely themed comment thread!
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Down's is caused by an extra chromosome, it's impossible to defeat the syndrome during development without modifying the genetic code of every cell in the body.
Removing the extra gene can't be done, but for curing the symptoms (including the mental retardation), this research looks very promising. And it's the symptoms that are the problem here.
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86.9% of pro-Obama voters, thought [howobamagotelected.com] Sarah Palin actually made that claim. In reality, it was Tina Fey, who said it, while playing Sarah Palin on TV.
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No, that statistic comes from a completely discredited and blatantly made-up poll [fivethirtyeight.com] made up to create and promote a movie attacking Obama.
Sarah Palin said that she was a foreign policy expert, especially on Russia, because Russia can be seen "from Alaska". In fact, a deserted coastline of Russia's can be barely seen sometimes from a deserted island in Alaska that Palin has never been to, that no Alaska governor has ever been to. Which is why she's mocked for saying that "she can see Russia from her house", be
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> In the mean time, you might want to take a google maps look at the Western U.S. and Canada.
There may be space for more more people, but do you really think we could support even the 6 billion people we have now if all of them would have american standards of living?
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That would only further remove survival of the fittest from this equation. I'd be much more interested to see people actually have to provide for themselves. My guess is that at least half of the world's population would simply curl up and die without public water and prepackaged meat.
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did you everthink of that.
and to see it from the other pov, once you are aware you have life, you want to keep it. (well most of us do).
Re:It's a deformed child, not a moral trophy (Score:5, Funny)
maybe that is because they don't fully understand what they are missing, or just can't compehend it ?
I tend to assume that's why most of the people who aren't me haven't committed suicide. Slashdot trolls: the reason 59th trimester abortions should be legal.
Re:It's a deformed child, not a moral trophy (Score:5, Insightful)
They? What about you? I'm sure there's plenty you don't comprehend and are missing but don't know about.
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You don't like hearing the stark truth, so you call me a troll.
I've probably thought about this issue far more than the knee-jerkers responding to me. I was born with enough complications that I'd have been dead half a century earlier. I still marvel that not only did I survive, I did so with high intelligence and good physical health. I am my abilities, and if I were destined to be without them, I'd rather my parents had thrown that four pound runt into the dumpster.
How many of you are willing to live defo
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I don't want to minimize whatever it is you have been through, but it's presumptuous of you to call everyone else's knee-jerk reactions as if you are the only person who has problems or has dealt with mental or genetic "disorders". You obviously don't have Down's Syndrome, so why do you think everyone with Down's would share your view if they were "normal"?
It sounds like you have setup a false dichotomy in your mind somehow that people are either "human" or not. Evolution has shown us otherwise innumerable
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How people with Down's Syndrome would respond "yes" to the question "Do you wish you born normal, like everyone else?"
How could they say that, when having that genetic defect made them who they are? To answer that question in the affirmative is to admit that they would unmake their entire lives, to never to have existed at all.
The false dichotomy is in the minds of the people who equate that reasoning with suicide, and who believe that aborting a Down's fetus is equivalent to executing a living, breathing c
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maybe that is because they don't fully understand what they are missing, or just can't compehend it ?
Then what is the problem?
Re:It's a deformed child, not a moral trophy (Score:5, Insightful)
No, they can't. Everyone will do everything they can to stop them, they'll have long periods of trauma and depressions, if they miss they'll be put in a psychiatric hospital, and it may make things worse.
In this world, killing yourself is potentially harder than killing someone else.
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> In this world, killing yourself is potentially harder than killing someone else.
I hear you! Ever since I killed my mother-in-law, I'm afraid she's waiting for me in hell. These days even crossing the street scares the crap out of me, suicide would be unthinkable!
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I think it's probably pretty easy to kill yourself if that is your actual aim. Especially where handguns are readily available.
I suspect that /most/ people who attempt to kill themselves simply wish to be shown love and getting attention from people is the next best thing.
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You've obviously never had a gun pointed at you. Point one at yourself. Go ahead, try it.
Why do you think military training takes so long? Self-preservation is a hell of a fear. If you are in a situation where you know you could die very easily, this hidden fear kicks in HARD.
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I've been attacked with a chisel and threatened with a knife and (separately) a brick. But then I wanted to live.
Fear has paralysed me at one time when I was rock climbing as a child. So I know something of the self-preservation instinct.
But I imagine is you can base-jump (I don't think I could) then doing it without a parachute if you wanted to die wouldn't be too hard.
Also there are gentler ways like gas (CO?) suffocation while you sleep, ...
Comment removed (Score:4, Insightful)
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So I can commit any atrocity I want as long as I give my victims the option of suicide to escape it?
How is not killing someone who doesn't express explicit desire to be dead an atrocity again?
Suicide is actually a terrible thing, even (especially?) for those who commit it.
So is killing someone without their explicit approval.
I don't think it's humane to say "Oh, you don't like the life we forced you to have or the world we forced you to live in? Kill yourself!". Actually, I think you're sick.
Uh huh. So i
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Uh huh. So it's more humane to say, "Well, we're pretty sure that you're not going to like your life, so we're going to take it away from you whether you like it or not."?
Before they're able to truly think or feel? Absolutely... afterwards: no, that would be barbaric... so it really comes down to at which point you consider the processes going on in a foetus to be considered "thoughts" or "feelings".
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Why do you think suicide is bad for the person who commits it, you don't appear to have a religion based/theistic morality yet your belief clearly presupposes some form of afterlife. Just curious.
What's worse, when you get old and possibly infirm, me telling you "your too old I'm going to kill you now" or me telling you "if you find you don't want to live anymore we can help you"?
Most folks with Downs I've known seem pretty content. I can't imagine what it would be like, but then I can't imagine what it mus
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Most folks with Downs I've known seem pretty content.
Actually, more than content. From all I know of the syndrome (which as I'm sure has been pointed out repeatedly already, I got here from a link and haven't read much yet, is more properly "Down Syndrome", no posessive), it's as if fate/$DEITY/whatever (heredity, but anyway) gave them the blessing of happiness in return for what it took away. Despite all the problems they live with that you or I would never choose to have, they tend to be some of the most consistently happy people around and in general ten
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And to your solution I have another, if the kid really feels that way, there is an easy way: suicide. If they felt that it was best not to have existed they can kill themselves. But honestly, I don't see any sky-high suicide rates for mentally impaired people, dying people or people with health conditions.
While possibly true, two details remain.
Abortion is legal, where suicide is illegal.
And once a person tries to kill themselves, they are locked down so they can't use their hands nor move. Most people don't consider that an improvement to their life style.
Re:It's a deformed child, not a moral trophy (Score:5, Insightful)
Have you ever spent time with someone with Down's Syndrome, severe Autism,
Re:It's a deformed child, not a moral trophy (Score:5, Informative)
You're right about people with Down's syndrome though.
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Misnomer.
It should really be called Up syndrome.
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Like children, they may not be demonstratively conscious of the way the world works, but they're chock full of raw instinct. Dogs have the emoti
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There are a vast range of people with some type of autism.
We've had quite a few autistic kids (relative to what you'd expect) in our pottery studio and they generally have been happy and fun to be around but very hard work for their parents/carers!
Re:It's a deformed child, not a moral trophy (Score:4, Insightful)
Then perhaps the solution for a perfectly happy society is to lobotimize ourselves, become completely dependent on our caregivers, and die at thirty.
Wait, isn't that Logan's Run?
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Actually, Soma by itself is only mildly psychotropic at the commonly prescribed dose, but it is a strong potentiator of opioids, so mix your poisons carefully.
Yes, it's a real drug (a skeletal muscle relaxant), and I couldn't stop myself from giggling when I filled my prescription a few years back.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carisoprodol [wikipedia.org]
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The word "Soma" dates back to at least the 10th century BCE, was probably in use before the 25th century BCE, and is thought to be a tea made from Asian ephedra (which contains alkaloids not present in American ephedra), a stimulant that constricts blood vessels and increases blood pressure and heart rate, so it has a very different effect indeed from Carisoprodol.
Archaeological evidence indicates that, unlike the version of Soma used by Zoroastrians, the ancient Aryan one that many historians think is the
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There is graveyard near where I live.
Its full of people with no problems at all. From where I stand, they must be VERY happy.
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The mentally retarded kid (back then we weren't told whether it was Downs, Autism, etc) I went to school with back in the day spent a good portion of his time angry and frustrated that he wasn't "getting" things like the other kids were. He'd usually be ok, say, out on the playground, but not in class.
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There's a lot more "outside" than "inside", so maybe we should euthanize the smart ones
I sure see lots of stupid people around here (including me), we're lucky that nobody is going around euthanizing us just because we don't meet some arbitrary standard.
Seriously, in the long run the odds appear to be => we are all dead. Even if we somehow make it out of this solar system to another viable on
My cat seems happy... (Score:2)
But I think most parents are aiming for a person, not a house-pet.
Also (Score:5, Insightful)
Shooting people in the head means they won't get cancer!
I'm not sure what your experience is but I've met and known quite a few people with Downs Syndrome who seemed happy. Certainly as happy as the rest of us at any rate.
It seems rather ridiculous to assume their lives aren't worth living. What next, deciding a childs life isn't going to be worth it because they aren't as sexy as Hugh Jackman or hung like Ron Jeremy?
Re:Also (Score:4, Funny)
If being hung like Ron Jeremy meant I had to look like Ron Jeremy, I'd probably pass.
Re:Also (Score:5, Funny)
What next, deciding a childs life isn't going to be worth it because they aren't as sexy as Hugh Jackman or hung like Ron Jeremy?
You mean, you aren't? And yet you keep pressing on everyday, you brave little soldier...
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Well, if my children were not to be sexier than Ron Jeremy, I would consider abortion.
Re:Also .. avoid procreation! (Score:2)
Well they will look like you so ... probably best to avoid conception. That may or may not be a problem, you're on slashdot so I'm guessing not.
</joke>
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I am sexier than Ron Jeremy, and their mother is way hotter than I.
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I smell a nobel prize idea here...
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What next, deciding a childs life isn't going to be worth it because they aren't as sexy as Hugh Jackman or hung like Ron Jeremy?
I sure know that's why *I* killed myself!
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What next, deciding a childs life isn't going to be worth it because they aren't as sexy as Hugh Jackman or hung like Ron Jeremy?
How many children do you know that are hung like Ron Jeremy ?
And how did you find out, eh, EH ?
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Sure they're happy, they don't know any better. Question is... are the parents?
Trading two normal people's happiness* (and resources) for one Down's person's happiness doesn't seem like a fair trade.
*Or even three people's happiness - a normal child can be happy too!
Moral Atrophy, not a moral trophy (Score:2)
Wouldn't you prefer never to have existed if you knew you would be subjected to mental retardation, health complications, and a short lifespan?
"Good point. You may go." -- Your friends, Orange Roughy (140 years), Bristlecone Pine (4500 years), Galapagos Tortise (150 years).
To preempt complaints regarding non-human intelligence, we defer to Douglas Adams on the subject of humans, dolphins and digital watches.
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It depends -- for how long would I get to suck on Palin's tah-tah's? I mean, theoretically, that's a perk you could probably -ahem- milk for a few years, no?
Apparently, the Eugenics Movement lives (Score:3, Insightful)
There's already a treatment guaranteed to prevent the expression of these symptoms: abortion.
I know I'm violating Godwin's Law here, but in this case, to hell with Godwin. Nice answer there, Mein Heir; tell us, what are your exacting standards for the rest of humanity? Who else gets the axe in your perfect world?
Who the hell are you to tell people what kind of contribution they can make in this world? Who the hell are you to determine who gets to live and who has to die without even a chance for life? I've never in my 40 years met a family that regretted their Downs child. I've never met a family t
Re:Apparently, the Eugenics Movement lives (Score:5, Insightful)
What you've never met isn't people who regretted their childs. That is actually extremely common. What you have never met, is people who, in this polically correct society (and in other society that has similar levels of peer pressure), will admit to it, even to their closest confidents.
Considering your stance on the matter, which you seem to hold pretty dear from the wording you use (and you are fully entitled to it, I'm not saying you're wrong or anything), I doubt anyone would EVER dare tell you that they regretted their child, down's syndrom or not.
To give a different point of view, at the risk of getting flamed to hell and beyond, I really, really despise kids (don't worrie, I'll never have to make my significant other go through an abortion... snip snip and all, thats all taken care of). Like, really, REALLY hate kids. Everyone around me knows my stance on this. Because of this, I had a LOT of mothers and families tell me in secret how they wish they never had their kids. In certain cases, that they didn't even love them, but that they still did what they could so it wouldn't show. None of those were disabled child's families, either. And to make things clear, I don't live in a ghetto, and the people I'm talking about came from all kinds of families, from poor to rich, etc.
Only in Wonderland does all families consider their kids blessings, ESPECIALLY kids with issues. They may not admit it, they may WANT to love them. That doesn't mean they do.
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Only in Wonderland does all families consider their kids blessings, ESPECIALLY kids with issues. They may not admit it, they may WANT to love them. That doesn't mean they do.
I have a relative with Down's. She is 22 now with the mind of a 14 year old. Now, she is damn happy, as she was in a good part of her life. Happy, but depressed. Knowing how difficult everything was, trying to understand and not been able to rationalize why, and more important, why her.
But sometimes it is not about the kids, it is about the parents. You have no bloody idea how hard it is, how tiresome and how horrible things can be. You may believe that there is this lovable all-powerful man that sent this
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It can also be extremely unfair to the other kids, who get shunted out of the way and feel ignored, as the parents are forced to lavish extra care on the disabled child.
So... as you imply, it's not entirely about the happiness of the *disabled* child. That child also negatively impacts its parents, siblings, other relatives, and society, and does so for a long time before it contributes back to society (IF it is ever able to).
I've known happy, productive disabled people, and I've known disabled people who w
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Most people like only the second, but do all four because they think they want to.
Wait.....most people die because they think they want to ? Does that mean that if I really, really don't want to die I don't have to ?
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There are people in the world who are healthier, fitter, and smarter than you. Compared to them, you're disabled.
Should you therefore, according to your logic, be executed?
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How incredibly small minded. How do you think the super-genius thinks about your pitiful, semi-intelligent existence? Does that diminish the value you place on your own life?
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Everybody might have health complications. I am happy to live, even if I have thyroid dysfunction, and early graying.
Shorter lifespans are not so much of an issue. People smoke, eat a lot, and don't exercise, everyday, everywhere.
That leaves us with the central issue: the mental "retardation" problem.
In my case, I wouldn't mind having a much lower IQ than I have now. Most people I know do, and they are happy. I don't think rational abilities are that much important for a good life.
I know several individuals
Re:It's a deformed child, not a moral trophy (Score:5, Insightful)
There is a continuous spectrum of cognitive capacity from near-vegetative to super-genius. Are we supposed to decide people's right to live based on arbitrary cut-offs on tests that we already know aren't perfectly valid? Absolutely not.
I really wish that my advisor would get her study submitted and published so that I could link to it here. (I'm sure she says the same thing about my own as well).
She's been doing early intervention with DS kids much earlier than ever before and providing high-tech means for them to communicate. After 5 years the kids are entering school on-par with their peers.
It is starting to look like mental retardation is a secondary symptom of DS, not a primary one. DS results in SPEECH disability, which messes up language development, which in turn screws up cognitive development. We've been providing an alternative, non-speech, means to communication development and it has led to surprisingly positive results in cognition development. (This falls into the category of "manuscript in progress" and hasn't been published in a peer-reviewed journal yet, but I expect it to pass that hurdle in the next year or so).
Here is a description of the study methods.
http://www.aac-rerc.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=135&Itemid=152 [aac-rerc.com]
It's in Breeze. Sorry about that.
So, if it becomes known that Down syndrome only causes mental retardation when we fail to provide the right care and education, do you still think that abortion/eugenics is an appropriate treatment???
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Hmmm... maybe you replied the wrong post.
I was posting in your general direction, only not so assertive, because I don't have the argumentative means, only my personal experience.
About abortion, I live in an South American country. That kind of treatment is something few can afford here. I think it comes down to money right now. The choice has to take into account whether what you can afford is a good life for the kid. It is a difficult choice, and I would understand both sides.
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Yeah, sorry about that. I was mostly agreeing with you and adding on.
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It is starting to look like mental retardation is a secondary symptom of DS, not a primary one. DS results in SPEECH disability, which messes up language development, which in turn screws up cognitive development.
And that kids is why you should get a PSP instead, yikes, who'd 've thunk!
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When all you have is a hammer all your problems look like nails
I'll assume your not suggesting that all fetus should be aborted, and that it should be forced. So we'll go from there. If the mother decides to carry the pregnancy to term whats the wrong with preventing the child from suffering some of the debilitating side effects of DS.
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There's already a treatment guaranteed to prevent the expression of these symptoms: abortion.
Oh, I know the every sperm is sacred types will whine about this, but consider the desires of the child. Wouldn't you prefer never to have existed if you knew you would be subjected to mental retardation, health complications, and a short lifespan?
Yes, because no parent would ever want the option to save their child, and have them grow up normally.
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Wouldn't you prefer never to have existed if you knew you would be subjected to mental retardation, health complications, and a short lifespan?
Shitty attitude aside, you seem to be doing just fine.
LK
We're all retarded (Score:2)
Happy? Usually unless badly mistreated.
Stupid? Yes.
Short lifespan? Yes.
Health complications? Yes for many breeds.
Requires lots of care and attention? Typically.
If you're stupid enough, you might not even know what's the big deal about being stupid.
What really would be sad would be something like in the story "Flowers for Algernon", but that already kind of happens to people with Alzheimers or age onset dementia.
Lastly, if Bush really does get away with what he has done then he's smarter than most of
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My sister was diagnosed with Downs Syndrome before she was born, and was almost aborted. Twenty-one years later she's a healthy adult, without Downs Syndrome.
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Abortion doesn't prevent the expression of those symptoms. Contraception would.
Abortion doesn't prevent you from ever having existed. It ends your existence.
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Why not apply the same logic to incurable (or hard-to-cure) deceases developed later in life?
Re:It's a deformed child, not a moral trophy (Score:5, Insightful)
Wish I had mod points. You deserve some for being absolutely right while likely getting flamed into oblivion for it.
The GP is not right. All the things he mentions are relative, not absolute. People with DS can lead happy, fulfilling lives, and that's really the only thing that matters in this case. Before you judge the value of the lives of people with DS you should ask them whether they would have preferred not to have been born.
Re:It's a deformed child, not a moral trophy (Score:4, Interesting)
Can? Sure.
Need to? Hell no, not in a world overpopulated by a factor of 2-5.
I don't have to ask anyone to judge their value in that context. At its coldest, its not hard to judge absolute value -- what is the benefit a birth will bring to society versus its cost.
If you want to talk relative vs absolute, there's a pretty significant percentage of people who end up in the red on that count.
If society has a certain amount of resources available to support the raising of the next generation, and the birth of the child in question will use the resources that otherwise could've been used for ten children without fundamental genetic defects, that's a pretty absolute value judgment as well.
The GP is absolutely right -- we as a society (particularly in the US) fail miserably at making rational judgment calls because of a misguided and unjustified assignment of irrational amounts of value to a bunch of cells.
Re:It's a deformed child, not a moral trophy (Score:4, Insightful)
I don't have to ask anyone to judge their value in that context. At its coldest, its not hard to judge absolute value -- what is the benefit a birth will bring to society versus its cost.
If you want to talk relative vs absolute, there's a pretty significant percentage of people who end up in the red on that count.
How do you measure the benefits and costs to society? In dollar value? That would be pretty much impossible, certainly in the case of benefits. How can you quanify the benefits a person brings?
If society has a certain amount of resources available to support the raising of the next generation, and the birth of the child in question will use the resources that otherwise could've been used for ten children without fundamental genetic defects, that's a pretty absolute value judgment as well.
I don't agree with this. A society is about people giving and taking. Different people give and take different amounts and this varies with their environment and the stage of their life. I know of people with DS who definately contribute more than they take. Converesly I know of a lot of people who take considerably more than they give. I wouldn't advocate killing people on that basis.
Incidentally I'd be interested to know how you get the over-populated by 2-5 figure. I'm not arguing with it, I'm just curious.
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Because Human life isn't valued in economic terms, not yet anyway. By your judgment, everything up to and including genocide would be perfectly justified as long as the balance sheet came out positive.
There is no line where the unthinkable becomes OK. If it's wrong for a million people to be killed for a reason, then it's also wrong for 1 person to be killed.
According to this http://www.aafp.org/afp/20000815/825.html [aafp.org] diagnosis is usually done at 16 weeks at the earliest. That puts the baby squarely in th
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That's why it is so important to consider the costs. Before you have sex consider - if we make a child how will I look after them and care for them for the next 18 years. If you can't or won't then don't have sexual intercourse and you won't have to.
If you really need to get your end off that bad there are other ways that will not end in conception of a child (you say blastocyte, I say prenatal child).
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Using your logic (and the GP), we can also go on to destroy the parents of said deformed cells because of their likeliness to produce another set of deformed cells. It may sound like an extreme but it's also the next logical step. Sure, the next step could try to prevent said people from reproducing, but we all know that would never work seeing as the words "unwanted pregnancy" are all too common.
I'm all for birth control (pre-conception) but abortion never sits right with me. I also believe that there a
Moral Philosophy (Score:2)
The GP is absolutely right -- we as a society (particularly in the US) fail miserably at making rational judgment calls because of a misguided and unjustified assignment of irrational amounts of value to a bunch of cells.
The thing is it's not purely a rational decision. Well, not in a single case.
We're founded upon the idea that "all men are created equal, endowed by our creator with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness."
If you take the purely utilitar
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But once born, no one, not even themselves, can legally decide to end their life. Now I'm not advocating OP's idea. Like you said, people with DS can lead happy, fulfilling lives. But on the flip side, those without it can lead miserable, empty lives. What I mean is, whether you have DS or don't have DS, does not dictate the type of life you will live. Which is why we need to make suicide legal. No one ever asked to be born. If someone wants to die then they should have that right, no matter their age or physical/mental condition. And yes, I know if someone is really insistent on dying, they will complete the deed no problem. That still does not excuse all the brain-washing going on by friends/family/church/society/etc to make people believe that suicide is some sort of ultimate Bad Thing.
I don't like the idea of suicide being legal or accepted for two main reasons.
First is that people often want to kill themselves because of badly managed depression or psychosis, and these people can and often do recover.
The second is that quality of life is a function both of yourself and your environment and crucially personal and social expectations. So if somebody's quality of life is poor or they feel they are a burden and it is socially acceptable for them to kill themselves, then it may become a soc
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Or, prevent births from those deemed unfit [wikipedia.org].
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It's also her son, not her grandson as GP spewed.