The Pros And Cons Of Biomedical Engineering

In the year 1986 a health care policy was established. This policy is known as the “Health Care Engineering Policy Committee”. Carl Mitchem (1990) describes that this policy was made to safeguard humans from engineering experiments. He also states that a good decision making process should be endured before ultimately proceeding with these practices. (p. 229) Although this policy was made in order to keep people safe from engineering practices, we still face ethical dilemmas due to the engineering profession simply not following this policy. A very common controversial topic within the career of biomedical engineering is genetics. Within biomedical engineering comes what is known as “germline engineering”. In this branch engineers partake in cell and modifications. Dr. Philip Brey (2009) refers to this is as a “more controversial practice in which genes in eggs, sperm or
2) Knowing that this practice has long term side effects they are not even aware of, engineers continue to risk lives and humanity as a whole. Although this branch of engineering can enhance and perhaps protect a human from infections and diseases, many people object this type of practice due to the fact that it is seen as “playing the role of God.” People believe it is not ethical thus creating an ongoing dilemma. Another controversial practice within the biomedical engineering profession is tissue engineering. This practice involves the use and modification of organs and tissue to grow an artificial organ to implant into other humans to further sustain life. To sustain life can alway be an excellent thing, but engineers don’t seem to think about the consequences that come with such unethical practices. Dr. Brey (2009) states that this engineer practice is rather controversial due to the fact that the cells and tissue used to create this artificial organ are from a mix of humans, plants, and animals. The origin of each human part of the organ is tissue of embryos of aborted