" In this oath it states that physicians should use their knowledge in order to treat others in the highest degree possible. In many cases doctors feel that they aren't doing enough for their patients who will eventually die because of an inherited disease. In cases like this, genetic enhancement would minister to a lot of Americans, both doctors and patients. Our nation has already advanced into that of a place in which people are dependent upon medicines to survive and function. Allergy, inflammation, headache, and cough can all be treated by over-the-counter pills to stop the problem. Does that mean that we should stop using medicine that science and research has concluded to be effective because wellness shouldn't fall in the hands of scientists? Although genetic enhancement is a far stretch from Tylenol, the correlation between the two still stands. Both genetic enhancement and medication were created in order to help patients with treatable illness, and, therefore, it is a doctor's obligation to try, and a patient's right, in many cases, to use whatever will abed his or her problem.
In order to understand why the debate has risen into vast proportions it is best to define what genetic enhancement can offer, in terms of science and healing, and what it should exclude. Genetic enhancement has everything to do with changing DNA make-up and sequence so that it can correct certain problems, but that does not include the building of new things, besides genes. An example of one such exclusion would be cloning. One of the most heated debates in both political and religious realms, and the issue that Dr. Schmitt of University of Chicago speaks, is creating a new "human" or organism, and although benefits and drawbacks are both heavily weighted, it is not something in which genetic enhancement holds relevance. Genetic enhancement would strictly be gene mutilation in order to promote disease prevention (Schmitt 111).