Brett Daniel Shehadey
Special Contributor for In Homeland Security
In April of 2012, seven year old Emily Whitehead recovered from leukemia using genetically modified (GM) [reprogrammed] T-Cells with HIV to target the cancerous B-Cells without being detected and attacked by her natural immune system. Previous attempts for two years of chemotherapy treatment were unsuccessful. At the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia Cancer Center Emily became the first to undergo the CTL019 therapy.
Emily remains one year to this day cancer free. CTL019 T-Cell Therapy is still undergoing clinical trials for B-Cell Cancers like leukemia.
The world has come a long way since 2005, where scientists were able to use genetically engineered HIV and turn it into a cancer seeking machine against metastasized melanoma cells in mice. Irvin S.Y. Chen, director of the UCLA AIDS Institute said in 2005:
“For the past 20 years, gene therapy has been hampered by the lack of a good carrier for therapeutic genes that can travel through the blood and aim itself at a precise location, thereby minimizing harmful side effects…Our approach proves that it is possible to develop an effective carrier and reprogram it to target specific cells in the body.”
We are reaching the age of the Bourne Legacy, where the use of a virus to alter the DNA or gene expression and functions of a human being is becoming possible. In the movie, Aaron Cross (Jeremy Renner) has been virally treated to increase intelligence, strength and speed. The catch was the sell: he was an injured soldier and the treatment provided was more about experimentation than ethical or moral concern—performance and the treatment of a human being as a subject or thing.
It is always acceptable to bring these new technologies to little children with cancer or impaired and injured adults, but what comes after that? After the technologies become less controversial and prolific in usage do the ethics then fall apart and eugenics programs and weaponization proliferate around the world?
Not only will this likely lead to GM human beings created for war but it will lead to genetically engineered methods of state terror and terrorism globally.
The biotech weapons will target specific cells of the body, attacking them and shutting them down. The following generation of bioweapons will alter an enemy population or tribe’s DNA, making them slower, mentally retarded, weaker or passive; perhaps a combination.
The only way to stop or prevent this will likely be forced GM vaccinations of a population that harden cells against viral genetic delivery systems or gene therapy when possible. But this may be a latent or dilatory defensive biotechnology behind what is becoming available right now. Another way to eliminate or counter a genetically engineered viral delivery system will be through the usage of robots at the nanometer scale (nanobots) that can effectively serve as a second [artificial] immune system specifically programed and designed to counter manmade GM pathogens.
Still, any defensive biotechnology, even reactionary vaccinations once an outbreak is identified, will likely be a tad bit slower than the production of bioweapons—as is the case for most offensive-to-defensive technologies.
While on the one hand, these new GM techniques on humans will give us great advances in medicine, it will also give our enemies great advantages in social engineering and terrorism. Awareness, compassion, ethics and vigilance are all required to keep America safe.
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