US President's Council on Bioethics

Today, the US President's Council on Bioethics held a symposium about genetic enhancement and sport. Perhaps not your usual forum for this kind of debate, though the Council has tended to spend time on issues that are not typically considered to be healthcare priorities for the US. In response, if one accepts that doping in sport is a public health concern - given that it can have implications for youth sport and drug use - then the Council might actually be heading up an important, new priority. The transcript of this meeting is online at:

http://www.bioethics.gov/transcripts/jul02/session4.html

American Society of Gene Therapy

The annual meeting took place in Boston from 6-9 June and included a symposium on Gene Doping. Speakers and papers were as follows:

Scientific Symposium SS310
Ethics - Genetic Enhancement for Athletic Performance
Co-Chairs:

Theodore Friedmann, MD
Johann Olaf Koss

Speakers:

Gary I. Wadler, MD
Doping in Sport

Arne Ljungqvist, MD, PhD
Present Problems in Doping - Detection and Screening

Barry J. Byrne, MD, PhD
Gene Transfer for Sport Enhancement?

Johann Olaf Koss
Gene Transfer Enhancement in Sport: An Athlete's Perspective

Maxwell Mehlman, JD
Should Sport Open the Door to Genetic Enhancement?

The Hastings Center and Sport

The renowned bioethics institute 'The Hastings Center' has been awarded a grant to research 'Ethical, Conceptual & Scientific Issues in the Use of Performance-Enhancing Technologies in Sports'. The funding is provided by the US Anti-Doping Agency and is, to my knowledge, the first study of this kind. Rarely has funding been provided for critical inquiries into the ethical foundation of performance enhancement and sport. The project runs until the end of 2003 and is led by Thomas H. Murray, Erik Parens & Angela Wasunna.

link to details