That Time Already Or. Ethical Dilemma's

Hello Dear Readers,
I'm just going to jump right in with, I couldn't think of anything to write. And I know that I have two weeks to think of something, but those are also still two weeks of Vet School term 3, which really keeps me busy trying to not fall to far behind in any one subject while prepping for whatever test I have coming up (there are a lot) so instead of me just cutting this post short I am going to present my Ethics paper for your reading pleasure? (sure why not) and some photos because I can.

TTFN and sorry for not having something more pertinent if I think of something I will make a post next week.

Cloning for the purpose of de extinction: an ethical dilemma

The bucardo became an extinct species in 2000, in 2003 the last bucardo was born and died of respiratory failure minutes after birth (Choi, 2009). This singular case brings the ethical dilemma of de-extinction with its various avenues and rabbit holes. However, the purpose of this paper is to explore what the ethics of de-extinction are today, and what the ethics of de-extinction might be one day; by looking at the welfare of the animals involved. As in case mentioned above, if de-extinction were to become a viable process, what would the effects be on animal conservation, what would the impact on the environment be when releasing cloned animals and what changes in legislation would be required.

The process of de-extinction has several steps starting with sequencing the animal’s complete genome and ending with the implantation of a fertilized egg in to a surrogate dam. These processes are, for the most part, out of the scope of this paper, however, the last step is of great importance and is the beginning of the animal welfare issues. Evaluation of animal welfare will use the 5 freedoms 1) no anxiety, 2) behavior is to be normal, 3) to be comfortable, 4) free of disease, pain or injury, 5) have energy from food and water. (Kirwan, 2018, p1) The act of implantation causes the surrogate to lose three of its five freedoms; the freedom from fear and distress, the freedom of normal behavior and the freedom from pain and injury.  Most animals that are proposed for de-extinction have no domestic relatives, so in the act of tranquilizing, moving, and handling the surrogate is exposed to mental suffering; this is the loss of freedom from distress.  The freedom to normal behavior is loss by having to care for the fetus of a different species; therefore, that animal is being deprived of its normal behavior. Undue pain or injury caused by the pregnancy and parturition is the final loss “Cows and ewes used as surrogates for SCNT-derived pregnancies appear to be at increased risk of late gestational complications” (U.S. FDA, p, 199) (somatic cell nuclear transfer, SCNT is a method of cloning). Care of the surrogate is of the highest quality; however, it is currently impossible to complete the task with out compromising the before mentioned freedoms.

What of the offspring? What would its welfare look like? “There is an increased risk of mortality and morbidity in perinatal calf and lamb clones” (U.S. FDA, p, 199). Even with a high quality of care this seems to negate the freedom from pain. What happens to the welfare of the cloned animals once born and healthy? There is a very limited gene pool to pull from, the process of inbreeding would only be viable to an extent (Choi, 2009), so cloning and genome sequencing would need to continue.

If de-extinction were to become a viable process, there could be a fundamental shift in thinking about how to conserve endangered species. The possibility of cloning for the protection of endangered species is already being considered one of the better options available; “Conservationists in Brazil are poised to try cloning eight animals that are under pressure” (Coghlan, 2012). However, there are problems with this way of thinking, consider the Mammuthus primigenius one of the more popular de-extinction candidates; a 10,000-year-old woolly mammoth carcass that preserves muscle tissue the color of fresh meat (Wong, 2013). Consider the welfare of the cloned woolly mammoth, while in captivity its’ shelter, food, and water would be provided for, as well as the freedom from pain and injury. Nevertheless, the freedom to normal behavior, and freedom from metal suffering is not guaranteed. Now consider the mammoths welfare if it were reestablished as a wild species. Think of the welfare of the native intact species. The mammoths could presumable maintain normal behavior, and might also be free from mental suffering, there should be food, water and shelter. Still the environment has changed, “evidence reveals that current warming is occurring roughly ten times faster than the average rate of ice-age-recovery warming.” (NASA, 2018), which would lead to the loss of normal behavior and could create fear and distress, it could also lead to pain or disease. Three of the freedoms are potentially compromised for the mammoth, which might or might not be the case in the real world. Considering the impact on the native species there are invasive species models which could help shed some light on their welfare if mammoths were introduced; “Many species are limited primarily by food availability and secondarily by density-dependent factors” (Lohr, 2017 p.3), showing that they could impact the supply of food, the quality of shelter and the normal behavior of animals. There is also the potential for physical harm to humans. There is also a small possibility that through the cloning process unknown viral DNA could be copied leading to a viral outbreak in livestock, exotics, companion animals, or even humans. This is a very unlikely outcome, but all possibilities need to be considered. Another possibility is that the reintroduction of the wooly mammoth could help the environment (Mann, 2018) making it an important ecologic species.

Currently de-extinction and animal cloning have no federal laws. Rather, de-extinction has a set of guidelines laid out by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). Cloned animals used for food have a set of health guidelines that need to be adhere to. For example, if the dodo bird were brought back, and subsequently domesticated in the U.S. using an entirely cloned population for the production of meat and eggs for human consumption; there would be a required health check to insure quality of the products. If the animal did not meet FDA standards for human consumption then they would, like non cloned animals, be used in animal feeds. “No animal feed risks unique to clones were identified in the Risk Assessment” (U.S. FDA, 2008, p.3). Now reflect on human cloning and the field which is more associated with the genetic manipulation processes of de-extinction eugenics, which also have limited laws and regulations. Currently Australia has very strict laws allowing only curtain licensed individuals to perform certain parts of the process but never to complete a human clone; “Offense—placing a human embryo clone in the human body or the body of an animal” (AU, NHMRC, 2017 p7). The U.S. has no federal laws banning cloning, only sanctions on government spending in the areas of human cloning. However there are no such sanctions for animal cloning. Revive and restore a non-profit organization, and one of the largest de-extinction groups is based on charitable donations and not government funding, thus circumventing the limitations of government funding. (“Lour, 2018). Still once an extinct species has been successfully cloned it could come under the endangered species act, and thus government protection and taxpayer money, or they might be classified as invasive (IUCN SCC, 2016, p17). The lack of federal laws in the U.S. leaves it to states to regulate human cloning. The lack of laws means cloning is essentially an open field where abuse of processes and techniques designed for de-extinction being used in human cloning is a very real possibility. Having the partial genome for a person could lead to the cloning of historic figures, although unlikely, as current cloning techniques would allow for the cloning of those living as well as the recently deceased, albeit with many failed attempts. It is this fact which has kept full human cloning from being attempted as it would be unethical to have hundreds of failed attempts. Just as the de-extinction process calls for the use of hundreds of surrogates, 208 embryos were implanted for the cloning of the bucardo, 7 goats became pregnant and of those 1 made term (Choi, 2009), while these are only animals there is still an ethical dilemma that faces those seeking the return of extinct species.

De-extinction is mostly still theoretical in nature, with the single exception of the bucardo. As such the ethics are still only mostly theoretical as well. Yet the current state is only for today. Looking forward as de-extinctions techniques evolve and change, so will the ethical issues surrounding it. The facts remain the same, some species have become extinct, whether due to environmental changes or the effects of the human population, makes no difference to the extinct species. A dead animal no longer requires welfare, so we should instead focus on the task of preserving the welfare and lives of living animals, and the welfare of the animals used as surrogates.  “UNLESS someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It's not.” (Seuss, 1971).

References:

Choi, Charles Q. “First Extinct-Animal Clone Created.” National Geographic, 10 Feb. 2009, www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2009/02/news-bucardo-pyrenean-ibex-deextinction-cloning/.

Seuss, Dr. The Lorax. New York: Random House, 1971.

“Our Supporters.” Revive & Restore, 19 Mar. 2018, reviverestore.org/our-supporters/. https://reviverestore.org/our-supporters/

 

Kirwan, A.P. (2018) Ethics in Veterinary practice, St. George’s University.

United States, FDA, “Animal Cloning: A Risk Assessment.” Animal Cloning: A Risk Assessment, Center for Veterinary Medicine, U. S. Food and Drug Administration, Department of Health and Human Services, 1 Aug. 2008. www.fda.gov/downloads/AnimalVeterinary/SafetyHealth/AnimalCloning/UCM124756.pdf. 

Coghlan, Andy. “Brazil Aims to Clone Endangered Animals.” New Scientist, New Scientist, 12 Nov. 2012, www.newscientist.com/article/dn22493-brazil-aims-to-clone-endangered-animals/. 

Wong, Kate. “Can a Mammoth Carcass Really Preserve Flowing Blood and Possibly Live Cells?” Nature News, Nature Publishing Group, 30 May 2013, www.nature.com/news/can-a-mammoth-carcass-really-preserve-flowing-blood-and-possibly-live-cells-1.13103. 

NASA “Climate Change Evidence: How Do We Know?” NASA, NASA, 8 Aug. 2018, www.climate.nasa.gov/evidence/.  

Lohr, Cheryl A., et al. “Modeling Dynamics of Native and Invasive Species to Guide Prioritization of Management Actions.” Ecosphere, vol. 8, no. 5, 15 May 2017, doi:10.1002/ecs2.1822. 

Mann, Paul. “Can Bringing Back Mammoths Help Stop Climate Change?” Smithsonian.com, Smithsonian Institution, 14 May 2018, www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/can-bringing-back-mammoths-stop-climate-change-180969072/.

United States, FDA, “Guidance for Industry Use of Animal Clones and Clone Progeny for Human Food and Animal Feed” Guidance for Industry Use of Animal Clones and Clone Progeny for Human Food and Animal Feed, Center for Veterinary Medicine, U. S. Food and Drug Administration, Department of Health and Human Services, 15 Jan. 2008 https://www.fda.gov/downloads/AnimalVeterinary/GuidanceComplianceEnforcement/GuidanceforIndustry/UCM052469.pdf

 

Australia, (NHMRC) National Health and Medical Research Council,“Prohibition of Human Cloning for Reproduction Act 2002.” Prohibition of Human Cloning for Reproduction Act 2002, 21 Sept. 2017. www.legislation.gov.au/Details/C2017C00306. 

IUCN SSC (2016). IUCN SSC Guiding principles on Creating Proxies of Extinct Species for Conservation Benefit. Version 1.0. Gland, Switzerland: IUCN Species Survival Commission https://portals.iucn.org/library/sites/library/files/documents/Rep-2016-009.pdf

Trying to be a Pirate Or Draw me a Blank

Hello Dear Readers, So I had a idea for a post early last week but then after sitting on it for 5 days I changed my mind and decided that that would have been a stupid post! And now I don't have anything even remotely interesting to write about, which usually means that I would just say "hey its going to be a short one this week" but I did say that last week so I feel like I should at lest try and write something interesting for you so here goes I am literally going to just dig up some of my old projects and ideas, to throw at the post this week and we will see how that goes? (spoiler it goes bad so you might as while stop reading now and save yourself)

Well this went not great turns out that I don't have the documents that I thought I did and I do not have time to recreate them, so here is my pet project this term.
Being a vet student in the Caribbean means that you absolutely need one thing, a pirate flag! Now obviously I don't have just buckets of free time so it takes some time for me to decide what works and what looks good, now this started because 1. I felt like it would be fun to have a pirate flag hanging on my apartment, 2. since there is a large banner of Nic cage hanging in one of the buildings on campus, I wanted to make a Nic cage flag since he is the patron saint of SGU.
This is what came from that endeavor

This one is pretty bad but I liked the skull

 This one was better but still not great

Since I already had the stuff together I had another Idea for a more vet/Grenada and this one is what came out of that, (this took about 8 weeks of very very rarely working on it)

but this still looked like crap but I let it sit for a couple of weeks during midterms and the following weeks, but we had that long weekend so I jumped back on this purely selfish project and see if I could sort this out.






So I started by figuring out the V I wanted it to be a bit more medical while still trying to keep a realistic feel, so this is what came of that.
Then I turned to the center peace the Heartskull (fun fact I used a dog heart as a base) then I needed a bit more behind that in the center I started with just lines but I didn't like how clean that looked so I went with period fishing spears and that fit so nicely.
Finally I needed to put all of this together and make a flag (or at least a mock up of a flag) which lead to another small problem where do I put everything, I liked that fraction look that the last prototype, but I wanted to have a better balance so I staggered them across the flag, I really like the way this one turned out.
Sorry this one was pretty random, the next week will hopefully be better, it will also be the last scheduled post this term so I will make sure it is on time. TTFN

Varrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

Boomerang , Or How we all Stay Sane

Hello Dear Readers, It's kinda getting crazy with only about 4 weeks till finals start, also I have 4 quiz's and a final that will happen before then, a four day weekend for Easter and I alter from feeling like I can't possibly get though, understand and remember all the material for the tests and beyond. and feeling like I might be able to pull off high marks on some of the test, and a confidence that I can beat this term, but we will see how it goes, all I can do is my best and that will just have to be good enough.
On to the core of this post, this last week in physio 2 we have been going over a lot of "review" of bio-chem, at the same time I got a Facebook memory of some notes that I had posted when I was in bio-chem which I promptly used to help complete some homework, I am honestly surprised by how much of my undergrad classes have come back to me and helped me to better understand some of my classes, I will also say that there are also classes and lectures that seem to have nothing to do with my classes, this is mostly since the whole of my undergrad is covered in the first slide set, vet school is hard their is no doubt about that.
Now you maybe wondering with all this stress how does one stay sane (or at the very lest, not go more crazy), well that's a bit of a tricky question mostly since there is a different answer for each individual, the advise I received a long time ago was to be a good vet you need a hobby that has nothing to do with animals, for me it was racing cars but since I can't really do that on Grenada (unfortunately), however I was lucky enough to find Improv Club here and now when I am on island that is how I deal with my stress, the big thing for me is not the actual improv (although I think I am getting the hang of it and it is very fun), the big thing is that I have friends that I can have fun with.
Friends really good friends that you can talk about anything, your problems, your success, the stuff that they don't really care about, someone who makes who makes you go to a beach front restaurant, a Friend, BFF, Confidant, a Best Vet School Buddy. TTFN 

WellnessWeek, Or Quiz quiz go away, Or Smoke roll on by

Hello, dear readers last week was a bit dark so this week i figured I would talk about some good good stuff.
Starting with wellness week a week full of events put on by SAVMA (Student AVMA) which is pretty cool there are loads of different things to do, like free massages, bob rose panting nights, a wellness lunch lecture everyday, I am sure I am missing some events and other wellness stuffs. But the most important one of the events was a collaboration with the Improv Comedy Club, the show we put on was sort of the big week ending event, and as a bones the show went real real well.
In other news I finished up my first round of quiz's which has had it's ups and downs, but at lest I get a bit of a mental stress break for a little bit. Well this was a short one, but before I go I have some interesting news a building in the True Blue industrial park caught fire today as far as I know no one was hurt, but it is wired coincidence considering that a building in my home county's town square just burned down, so just watch out dear readers and remember that fire is great till it's not. TTFN

I found a baby Gecko, Or AVMA site visit.

Hello Dear readers, This last week has been a bit wired, compounding this today was my first quiz which I felt super good about, and then it blind sided me with badly worded question. but that's now behind me I am going to take A extra hour off this afternoon, and then proceed to ace everything else this term.
Okay now that I got that of my chest let's move on to happier subjects like how the other day I found a Baby gecko on the inside of my windowsill (see photos) It was very small and extremely cute. there are a number of lizards on the island which for someone from south central Tennessee is a bit odd to see so meany, oh yes we see snakes, turtles, and the odd skink, but no big lizards or geckos.
In a totally unrelated event, SGU is still trying to get everything set up for the AVMA site visit which could end the schools accreditation (probably won't) but it has lead to RULES being enforced, since for the most part the school likes to put out these rules and never enforce them, It's like a fun game of Simon says but instead of doing what Simon says usually people just smile and node, like that's nice. here are some of the most ignored "Rules" no eating or drinking (expect for water) in the lecture halls, study rooms/halls, on the buses, and the one that makes since in the labs. the problem with this rule is that most clubs hold lunch lectures or meetings where food is available and where do you have these meetings Lecture halls, study areas, and some times in lab, so there would be a double standard if this rule was ever enforced (which it will be when the AVMA comes), next and my favorite rule from the AVMA directly, No animals in class. Since it would be a distraction (fair point) then the professors ask people to bring there dogs for lab which is 1 hour after lecture (not really enough time to go home get your dog, eat lunch, and then be back in time for lab.
anyway I will stop ranting now and go back to studding since I have a quiz on Friday, Have a good week, Do not let one mishap throw your whole week off. TTFN

Henry

Henry

Henry

 

God is Great, Or how I figured out vet school at the last possible moment!

Well Dear readers I did it I passed all my classes,
I really don't have much to talk about, I finally figured out my studding and I might have gone a little crazy as I honestly forgot how to go to sleep daring finals week. But I think that next term I won't go that insane! 
Besides that this blog will be going dark till August so I will see you all then thanks for going on this stress full trip, and till next time stay calm, have fun, and study hard.
TTFN

Injecting some Happiness, Or I have Weathered this Storm!

So Dear readers I realize that I have been talking a lot about the hardships and stress of vet school, but this week I figured I should talk a little about all the good things that have happened, or at the very lest the not negative things going on in my life right now.
I will start with my friends, and how super supportive everyone is and even though it has only been about 9 weeks since we all met (feels more like several years), I have always had something to smile about with all of them around and when you decide that learning pretty much everything about how animals work and the names of every single thing inside and out, you really need people who you can talk to about classes but also about whatever. I am a part of a very sporadic game of Torchlight 2 (remember studying comes first but you need to take breaks), also a on going (in between classes) discussion of a D&D game which may or may not come to pass but at the very lest the conversations are great (king of the dragonborn and a ranger without a bow), so yes friends are very important to keeping you on track and mentally sound.
Moving on with some of the things the school offers to help you stay happy (fair warning I Don't participate  with any of the stuff I am about to mention), like an ultimate frisbee club I know a few people who play with them all the time and they like it, there are thriving basket ball and FootBall (not US) leagues which even have teams and uniforms, the crossfit people are entertaining to watch after class, and if you would rather not flip tires the school has a (very) small gym, and if you go off campus you can get your scuba certification, lay on the beach, or rent a boat for a trip. And if you don't like the water there are island hikes every weekend, (I really have no idea how people find the time for these activates but I guess if I had a car and I could go racing I would unless there was a big test coming up).
Anyway It is very easy to fall into despair here, you know how much I have struggled here if you have been reading this blog, and it has been a good way for me to face my own problems head on, but what I haven't talked about is the fact that I always try to keep a smile on my face though everything I also try to cheer up those that are around me, because I am not the only one struggling and if I can make someone else smile then I fill a bit better about my problems. after all we all moved to an Island to go to vet school/med school, and we all feel the pressure building up like we live in systolic hypertension, (High blood presser during the contraction of the heart which maybe caused by a reduced elasticity of the aorta) but the we just have to take that bitter pill every morning, and try are very best to be better then we where yesterday, and last week, and last month, and last year. Smiling is the only way to get though it, and you need friends to smile with you, (it doesn't matter if they are human or animal friends, both are nice) and it doesn't matter if those friends are on the other side of the world complaining about there AC, or if they are down the hall they all make a big difference.
Well I will wrap it up Here for now, remember smile more and you will see the storm clouds roll away from the faces of those around you, also thanks for reading I will talk to you next week.

 Also we played with cows this week, which brings a smile to everyone's face.