Re: Can scientsit change unborn babies genes?

for humans, it is not true to say that scientists are changing the genes 
of unborn children. We simply do not have the technical know how, and 
even if we did, it would be too dangerous to try on human babies for a 
long time.

You can however choose which genes are inherited to some extent. For 
example, you can choose whether your offspring is a girl or a boy, 
depending on the legality of this process in your jurisdiction. You can 
choose not to allow a genetic disease to be inherited in some 
circumstances. Eye colour and hair colour could fall within this sort of 
definition; so for example, if you had 100 fertilised early embryos from 
the same couple, you could take single cells from each embryo, and test 
to see which ones had which hair/ eye colour genes. Some might be blue 
eyed, some brown or green eyed; and you could select which one. However, 
if both parents were e.g. homozygous blue, there is no way to have 
anything but blue eyed offspring.


Scientists are doing an awful lot of work on "enabling science", which 
could, in the dim distant future, enable people to change unborn babies 
genes. In this sense alone, scientists are trying to change the genes of 
unborn babies. 

hope this helps
david