What we're trying to do is offer families
the chance to do what they feel is ethically right.
I'm Shane McKay, a doctor in genetic medicine,
and regard the technological advances we've made
over the past 10 to 15 years, as being a tremendous blessing
and a wonderful thing that we can bring to bear
to try and help individuals and families,
either affected with, or at risk of severe genetic disorders,
to live and reproduce as normally as possible.
I think it's very important to make a distinction between
the efforts we make
to try and prevent a child being born with a severe genetic disease,
and the notion that we're somehow against disabled people.
Whenever you think about families who are already faced with the problem
of looking after a disabled child,
if you introduce another disabled child into the equation,
a second or third, that is an added burden on that family.
That detracts from the care they are able to offer
to their first or second child.
So, I think this is important we put this in context.
If you were trapped inside a burning in vitro fertilisation clinic,
and you had to have a four-year-old child in one room
and a vat full of embryos in another room,
I think most people would save the child first.
That's because we know innately a child is of more value
than the egg that leads on to a child.
In fact, I would find that the reduction
of the value and the joy of human life
down to something you could fit inside an egg cell, is slightly demeaning.