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Welcome to BIOTECH NATION !!! With understandable interviews requiring no background in science, BTN attracts a wide global audience. From everyday people looking for hope in treatments in development, to bioentrepreneurs interested in the experience of their fellow travelers, to venture capitalists looking for possibilities in cutting-edge breakthroughs, to scientists simply interested in the work of others, BioTech Nation is the voice of human endeavor, driving science to new realities for everyone. These interviews are drawn directly from the public radio program, "Tech Nation", which also can be heard in numerous global radio and podcasting venues.
Anthropologist Eben Kirksey asks us to look at the societal and ethical implications of CRISPR and not just hypothetically. He traveled to China with an eye to understanding the circumstance of the 3 CRISPR babies known to exist. He's here today with the Mutant Project, inside the global race to genetically modify humans. So, Eben, welcome to Tech Nation.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Thank you. Thanks for having me.
Dr. Moira Gunn:Now you don't have to research your background too far to see that quite simply you focus on science and justice. And some people may react, science and justice? What have they got to do with each other?
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Well, it's it's really about, you know, who gets to make science and and whose dreams come into contact with reality. It's it's about the future, really, and, who gets to shape it. So for example, with Science and Justice, you know, this book is is about CRISPR, this tool for, changing DNA. And the experiment at the heart of the book took place on a campus that didn't have potable water. So, you know, as people are approaching these cutting edge experiments, you know, it it's really a question of of what kind of, science gets funded, what kind of technology gets funded.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Do we support the infrastructure for the people, or do we support these breakthroughs that, might change the game, but also introduce new kinds of inequalities?
Dr. Moira Gunn:Now people are familiar with potable water if they're hiking or non potable water if they're hiking in the backcountry or they're they're traveling in sort of a off the beaten track kind of place. And it's like, well, I can't drink that. You have to have even better water than you can drink to do
Dr. Eben Kirksey:science. Yeah. I I found it remarkable. So so the the students at the university where doctor He Jiankui did his experiment, they either have to boil their water or get it out of these vending machines. So it's it's this this really dystopian futuristic landscape where you've got these cutting edge technologies.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:The vending machines themselves are are very futuristic. You have to have this WeChat smartphone app to unlock the water from the vending machines. So it's either, you know, 20th century technology, boiling it, or this technology that we don't have here in the states.
Dr. Moira Gunn:Well, let's just start with the CRISPR aspect. And, of course, you know, it's been in the news for some time, most recently with the awarding of the Nobel Prize to its inventors. Whether it's the genes of a grain of rice or a single bacterium or or a human being, remind us in everyday English what the tool CRISPR can do.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So very simply, CRISPR can change DNA. It can create targeted damage. So so the way that most people talk about it is as an editing tool. So with a word processor, you can write a sentence. If you don't like it, back up a few spaces, add some new letters.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:But CRISPR isn't that clean and simple. From my perspective, it works more like a Reaper drone. So with a drone, you give it GPS coordinates. It can take out a target, but sometimes it takes out the wedding party. That's that's more or less how CRISPR works.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:It produces targeted damage in your genome. And in in a technical sense, what it does is make mutants. So, the the technical term for what CRISPR does in the DNA is targeted mutagenesis. That just means that it makes mutations. And mutations, as we all know, are not things that you can easily control.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So sometimes it does the thing you want it to do. Sometimes it has all kinds of unintended side effects.
Dr. Moira Gunn:Well, I think the idea of editing a document with Word is a really great example because you say, okay. Great. I just made their, t h e I r, into their, t h e r e. But if you just sort of had instead of doing that so precisely, you actually kinda sent out looking for theirs to replace with theirs. I'm probably gonna get a better example the next time I do an interview, but that's the one we're working with today.
Dr. Moira Gunn:And it's like, no. I I don't want you to do it anywhere else, or I didn't know it was gonna do it over there. So we have to understand it's an imprecise tool even though it's a gene editing tool. Now in November 2018, exactly 2 years ago, you spoke at a science conference, the International Summit on Human Genome Editing, and you spoke on the topic of ethics. And it was at this very same conference that the Chinese scientist, doctor He Jiankui, announced his CRISPR experiment.
Dr. Moira Gunn:The result, twin baby girls, CRISPR edited. What was it like being there, and did anybody see it coming?
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Well, everybody did see it coming. You know, we've been talking for years about the ways that you could use CRISPR to change the DNA of of humans. You know, we're no different than rats or guinea pigs or or plants that this has been tested out. In some ways, CRISPR is a story that tells us we have a lot in common with other forms of life. But, you know, the the way that it played out was really surprising.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:I I was checking into a hotel where all the conference delegates were staying, and there was this guy there on the couch talking to Jennifer Doudna. And this guy, doctor He, was at the center of the controversy. We all had, you know, our PowerPoints. You you go to a conference usually a couple weeks ahead of time. Everyone asks you for your slides.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So we all had to, you know, quickly rethink what we were gonna talk about. And I found these videos on YouTube where along with many other people around the world, I learned how he basically brought together CRISPR with the tools of IVF in vitro fertilization. In some ways, it wasn't that, you know, surprising that he brought these two things together. IVF is a technology that's been around for 40 years. Louise Brown, the very first test tube baby she was called, was doing a book tour that year celebrating her 40th birthday.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:And, you know, all that was done was a little bit of, code for CRISPR was injected into, the baby cells when they were at the single cell stage. So the videos were were actually misleading. Doctor claimed that these 2 babies were as healthy as any others. But, what I learned in the course of researching this book is this was seriously misleading. So for the first time, we now know that these 2 babies who are modified at birth, with CRISPR were having serious health problems.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:They were in the neonatal intensive care unit as the story broke.
Dr. Moira Gunn:Well, there are all kinds of things that are kept and not kept, published, not published. And part of the fascination that I have with with your book, besides this great story of all kinds of things, is that you, at some point, decided you gotta go to see what you can find about doctor Hayes' laboratory in mainland China. When did that come over you?
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Yeah. So I've been to China before, and, I I went to the summit thinking that I'd written a book and was ready to publish it. And I was there in in the midst of this controversy. So I decided to go back and and really dig deeper into the story of what had happened with this this revolutionary new use of the technology. So I ended up being able to interview some of the parents who signed up for the experiment.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:I went to Doctor. Village and learned about the surprising story of someone who grew up in extreme rural poverty who went on to get a PhD in the US and then someone who became a key player in the innovation economy. And it's really a story not only about this one particular person, but the whole, China dream. So the China dream is this aspiration. It's an official policy of president Xi Jinping.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:And, basically, they want to disrupt Western modernity with an Asian future. So so this dream, in part, is related to the American dream, sort of the rags to riches, you know, people pulling themselves up by their bootstraps. And in many ways, doctor He embodies that story. But it's also a story of these disruptive cutting edge technologies, not only gene editing, but robotics and drones. The city where doctor He did this experiment, Shenzhen, is a place that aspires to, reach for the future itself.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:And this is where your smartphone is manufactured. This is where, if you have a drone, it was probably produced in Shenzhen. So so this story of disruptive innovation and biotechnology really fits within this broader story of China trying to become a new leader in soft power.
Dr. Moira Gunn:I actually like this. Look around, everybody. Shenzhen is very close to you wherever you are. It's like, all roads lead to Shenzhen.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Yeah. We we wouldn't be having this conversation today probably if it weren't for devices manufactured in Shenzhen. So so this this city that not many people in in America are thinking about is is really defining, you know, our lives right now.
Dr. Moira Gunn:We should probably say that in addition to the twin baby girls, there was also a subsequent baby born. Do we know about that baby?
Dr. Eben Kirksey:We don't know as much about the 3rd baby. So so the twins were born early at 31 weeks. We know that they had trouble breathing when they were initially born. They were held for weeks months in an intensive care unit and one of them was still in the intensive care unit when the news leaked about their birth, at the summit. So so in part, the book is telling the very messy behind the scenes story that led to that 3rd birth.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:And it really shows an experiment that kind of ran off the rails. At at a certain point, the parents were wanting to have a child. This was what was promised them at the outset of the experiment, and different members of the lab are trying to slow things down. Meanwhile, doctor He is being an entrepreneur. He's traveling to California, to Beijing.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:He's trying to start up a new company with a 100 doctors where he's gonna teach people how to use CRISPR in the fertility clinic. So amidst all this chaos, there was chaos in the lab. There was chaos as people were trying to make sense of the the birth and and this new genetic data. That's when this this couple emerges and very forcefully demands, that their embryo be released to them. And because of the way that the experiment was done, not entirely within the law, the couple was simply able to go to this other hospital, that was a collaborator and demand the embryo.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So they had an implantation against, you know, some very forceful messages coming from the lab saying we need to wait.
Dr. Moira Gunn:But at any rate, it seems that they had a had a very healthy baby girl so far.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So far. And it's it's a tough situation. So so right now, all these parents are living with complicated secrets. And, for starters, all the couples who signed up for these experiments, the the men are HIV positive. So in China, HIV is not a big problem in in the same way that it's not a big problem in the States.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:If you take your medicine, you're gonna have a life expectancy very similar to normal. In China, in contrast to the US, there's free HIV meds for anybody, who who who wants them. But the big difference is that there's serious stigma attached to HIV. So if if your employer finds out that you're positive, you could lose your job. You know, people with HIV have a very difficult time getting married or having a stable relationship.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So so in part, the identity of the parents, they're trying to protect, their identity because they don't want people to find out about their HIV status. At the same time, the scientific community really wants to study these 3 babies. And, you know, I I was able to get some of the very first reports back, not only about the the twins at birth, but this 3rd child. So the twins were born by c section, again, had a lot of problems at birth. The second birth, you know, suggests that maybe other things are going on too.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:You know, the the second birth was reportedly healthy. So it's it's very early days, and, it it was a very complicated social scene that went on around this experiment. And and I think we have a lot to learn. And, you know, really, the future of CRISPR depends on on what happens to these three children.
Dr. Moira Gunn:You're listening to TECHNATION. I'm Moira Wargunn and my guest today is Evan Kirksey, an anthropologist and member of the Institute For Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. He's also an associate professor at Deakin University in Melbourne. You may have read his work in Wired, The Atlantic, or The Guardian, a reference for his insights in such publications as The New York Times and the BBC. He's here today with The Mutant Project, Inside the Global Race to genetically modify humans.
Dr. Moira Gunn:Now we should say that doctor Hay was subsequently sentenced to 3 years in prison for illegal medical practice. What was illegal about it?
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So there's a number of things where he bent and broke the law. So, for starters
Dr. Moira Gunn:And this would be the Chinese law.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:This is China's law. And, so for starters, there's there's clear guidelines saying that if there is a genetically modified human embryo, you cannot implant it into a woman for for a pregnancy. So that's one clear law that he broke. But that law is associated with, licenses for clinics. It doesn't actually carry criminal penalties.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So he was charged with a statute in China that relates to medical malpractice. And Doctor. He is a biophysicist. He's not a doctor. He'd never conducted a clinical trial before.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:He had medical doctors on his team. He had an embryologist. He had an endocrinologist. The people who had experience doing IVF, standard fertility treatments, were part of the mix. But none of them, you know, the team initially didn't have anyone else who was experienced doing clinical trials.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So, another law that they, violated is is an unjust law, in my opinion. So if you are HIV positive in China, you cannot avail yourself of fertility treatments. So you can't go do IVF if you're an HIV positive man. So So so the participants, when they signed up, they knew that it was at the edge of the law. But I I really think, you know, doctor He thought that the Chinese Communist Party would be excited about this.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:He thought that this fit the script of the China dream. And and I think it was really the outrage, not just from the international community, but within China. You know, when when this experiment, was was first made public, you know, there was a few stories from the state media that tried to celebrate it, but very quickly on social media platforms, things like WeChat and Weibo, which are kind of like the the Facebook and Messenger of of China. You saw everybody saying things like, you know, why are you subjecting these these children to scientific experiments? You know, what about their health and well-being?
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Why is this being done? So, you saw a full range of comments. Some people in China celebrated it as a pioneering scientific breakthrough. And if you make a comparison to what happened 40 years ago with Louise Brown and the very first test tube baby, it was similar. You know, people called Louise Brown a Frankenbaby, and, it was a media circus.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Everyone from the pope to other scientists denounced the people involved in that experiment, Steptoe and Edwards, for monkeying with humans. But, now we have a Nobel Prize associated with IVF and it's become a standard everyday practice. So, you know, as as the dust clears, as doctor completes his prison sentence, you know, in in the long, play of history, you know, how is he gonna be remembered? I I was basically trying to tell a story that was both trying to take him seriously as a person, to not treat him as some monster, as many, journalists called him the the Frankenstein of China. But, you know, take seriously the ethical missteps that he made along the way.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:And I I think, for me, the missteps were going too fast and doing it in the name of profit. And this is what the Chinese court said when they handed down the sentence. He he was, in a court statement accused of pursuing fame and fortune. But in the book, I argue that's nothing unique to him. That's how all of these cutting edge technologies are being rolled out.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:A a lot of Silicon Valley entrepreneurs are also pursuing fame and fortune with CRISPR and and other disruptive tools.
Dr. Moira Gunn:Very interesting to learn that this was not just a scientist and an experiment as it was often described in the press, but in fact was, an entrepreneur. With that also, we have he goes to prison. You don't go to prison for unethical. You go to prison for what's illegal. So let's talk about that.
Dr. Moira Gunn:Where is this illegal in the world? Are there laws? Frequently, there are not laws if we don't have a technology yet.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So in the US, the legal framework is not very well developed. So in in the US, you already see a lot of genetic technologies that are in use in the clinic that have been outlawed in in other parts of the world. So when when I did research for this book, I also went to England and learned about this database where if you're a parent and you have prenatal testing, meaning you get pregnant and you wanna know about the genetics of your baby, there's 400 different conditions that that you can get tested. And, you know, there's a full range of things that lots of people know about. You know, we've we've all heard of Down syndrome.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:But but a lot of other syndromes are in there, that aren't necessarily a medical problem. So some boys, grow up looking androgynous and, might be hairless and and lanky. And this is from a condition called Klinefelter syndrome. So so right now, in the US, there's very few laws telling you what you can and can't test for in in your child. The US is also one of the only places where you can have an abortion if you don't like the gender of your child.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Many other countries have deemed that unethical. So right now, if if you wanted to use federal funds for this kind of research in the US, you could not. If you wanted to implant a genetically modified baby for purposes of pregnancy, you could not. But, it's it's actually not a very well developed legal framework. There's there's not criminal penalties if you break these rules.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So so the the prohibition against funding for this kind of research is in the appropriations bill, something that changes every every go round. And I've had some conversations with with staffers involved in this bill. And, you know, there's there's a big push from the biotechnology companies and from the medical industry to open up the floodgates and and let this technology into the clinic. But but I think, you know, we need to have a a lot more discussions about where this this technology is heading before it gets rolled out. And fundamental issues related to the safety and well-being of people who participate in these experiments, you know, that needs to be upfront, and, we need to have a lot more conversations like this.
Dr. Moira Gunn:I have to say that, we have to be really careful about I don't mean you and I, but I mean, in general, all of us have to be careful about the verbiage because we're trying to reduce it to words. For instance, you just said in the United States, if you didn't like the gender of your child, you could have an abortion. The law is very the space it creates enables that decision. It doesn't say, and if you don't like the gender, it's okay. You can have it.
Dr. Moira Gunn:The space is you don't really have to give a particular reason up until a certain point. In fact, you're prohibited from being asked what your reason is. So we have to be really careful about what do these things mean and when we talk about it ethically versus we talk about it legally. And so that's usually a conversation In general conversation, it's frequently merged.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Yeah. And and I think the real, dramatic tension between the Republican orthodoxy and the Democratic orthodoxy about issues surrounding abortion have shut down more nuanced conversations about what this technology can do. And in the book, what I'm also really interested in is the ways that technologies present us with new decisions that we might not anticipate, that we might not have the ethical language for talking through. And there's been some great work by some of my colleagues in anthropology going back to the eighties. My friend, Raynor Rapp, has a great book called Testing the Fetus that looks at amniocentesis when it first entered the clinic, and she describes women as moral pioneers who are suddenly confronted with new choices.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Women who for the first time had to decide, you know, knowing that they were going to have a baby with Down syndrome, should they have it. So so my book is is really trying to create a space for people to embrace new kinds of diversity, to make different kinds of decisions, and even to refuse some kinds of knowledges. You know? What what do you want to know about your child? You know?
Dr. Eben Kirksey:How much can genetics really tell you about the future of your child? There's there's companies out there that'll sell you a soccer test that will tell you, you know, does your child have the gene for soccer or the sprinting gene or, you know, musical aptitude. And and, basically, I found that these are all bunk. You know? We don't we don't, there's been a lot minute.
Dr. Moira Gunn:If it was sucker, I would test for you being a sucker. If you sent me money, the answer is yes. Positive. 100%.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Yeah. You know, companies are making a lot of money off of these tests. And, you know, I came of age, I was an undergraduate during the science wars where, you know, biologists and anthropologists were shouting at each other about nature versus nurture. And and in this book, I, you know, we we know a lot about genetics and we know about the interaction of genes right now, the sort of genomics. And, you know, the the earlier predictions about, like, the gauging or, you know, some of these other things just fall apart when you really look at the evidence.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:But but you also learned that, you know, certain things are relatively easy to manipulate. So blue eyes or not blue eyes is is just a single letter of DNA. So, you know, with a technology like this, if parents are permitted to make choices in the clinic, you know, this could have profound consequences for for eugenics. Eugenics is this long old idea about having good genes. That's what that term literally means.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:And this is what led to sterilization campaigns in the US and California and Oregon. This is what led to the Nazi death camps. So I think we need to be very careful as we think about, you know, optimizing people. What is what is the best baby? You know, these are these are conversations that scientists are are are starting to have and have been having for a long time.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:But I think those of us with training in the social sciences and humanities also have a lot to say about this. You know? Being being an interesting, you know, capable, quirky, fun human, you know, it's it's not something you can easily reduce to molecular signatures. So what is what is being human? You know, this is one of the other questions that this book explores.
Dr. Moira Gunn:Well, you mentioned a little bit about the biotech industry. I always like to follow the money trail. I mean, who is lobbying for this and where and about what in the world?
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So the the book has a brief encounter, with a lobbyist in in Washington DC So you you mentioned, the the Hong Kong summit that I went to so there was an earlier summit in in Washington and you know, not all summits Achieve sort of lofty goals and this this one, you know, there were reporters there, but no one really noticed So, about 5 years before, the controversy erupted in Hong Kong, we we had a similar event in in Washington where a lot of biologists and ethicists and anthropologists came together to to really think and speculate about where this technology is heading. And, you know, the the atmosphere in the room was was very democratic. It it was, aimed at being very inclusive. The people who organized this event tried to reach out to, you know, the transgender community, for example, to disabled activists, although they weren't able to ultimately include any disabled speakers from the stage. So so while I was sort of participating in this democratic exercise about the future of CRISPR the future of gene editing I saw one of the speakers get up to the podium and he announced that he was a lobbyist working on this and after he asked his question I followed him out into the hall and first, he just put up his hand
Dr. Moira Gunn:That's Evan's way.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Yeah. This is this is
Dr. Moira Gunn:this is my method. All of these people, you you see somebody and he follows them. Yeah. This is not the first time for Evan.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:This is this is what anthropologists do. Right? We're we're trained to kind of follow the story and follow the controversy. So I find this guy out in the hall, working on his laptop, and, I find that in real time, he's shaping legislation. So, you know, as this democratic discussion is happening next door, there's this one person who's who's being funded by industry to actually shape the law.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So it's a lot of, really smart and articulate, principled people who are working in this space. But, you know, as as a group, we we don't have a lot of legislative clout. So one of the reasons I I wrote this book is in hopes that more people are gonna raise their voices and express their opinions about, how CRISPR gets used in the future. There's a lot of pressing political issues if if no one's, paying attention to the news. You know, there's there's a lot of other things clamoring for space right now, but it's it's also so critical that, you know, we don't let all these other conversations drown out, important consequential decisions that are being made right now behind closed doors.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:More more of us need to participate in in this conversation.
Dr. Moira Gunn:And this is the time to have it. I I've often referred to the innovation cascade where you start out with an innovation, either a a real new one or a new use or unexpected use of one that exists. But once you have a new use, it's it's a new innovation. Then you have people who are kinda making decisions to use it and then society gets involved, you know. Should we do this?
Dr. Moira Gunn:Shouldn't we do that? And then suddenly there are laws. But if you're if you're saying, gee, I want this to be a, a profitable enterprise, you cut right to the laws. Forget about what society has discussed. Forget about a lot of people using it.
Dr. Moira Gunn:Cut right to the laws. So in in a real sense, this is the time we all need to be thinking about this, and it's a complex issue.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Yeah. And and I think one way that we can really reframe some of these conversations is is about, you know, pricing. So so there's a lot of conversations right now about health care, a lot of conversations about, you know, very expensive medicines that are starting to enter the clinic, whether it's for viral treatments, for hepatitis c. You know, that that was one of the first blockbuster drugs that was costing upwards of
Dr. Moira Gunn:You're cured.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Yeah. You're cured. $80,000.
Dr. Moira Gunn:How much is that worth to you?
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Yeah. I mean, you know, if if you're living with a lifelong infection, who's not gonna try to wrestle up $80? But they're pushing the envelope with with these genetic therapies. So the first one that was approved, by the FDA has a price tag of upwards of $400. You know, 80.80 grand is one thing.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:You know, many of us could try to, you know, scramble and do a GoFundMe campaign or, you know, like, cobbling together all that money is challenging when research, is producing these innovations and insurance companies aren't wanting to pay for the treatments. But, you know, we're getting into the price of of a decent sized house. And, you know, the the next one, that that comes through the pipeline is $2,100,000. Like, most people can't buy a $2,100,000 house. So how how are we gonna understand the future of these these medicines?
Dr. Eben Kirksey:You know, I I think, a lot of the research that goes into this is publicly funded, and there's there's been a change in US policy. It used to be that most medical innovation was supported by the government, and the private sector had a relatively small role to play. That shifted. And and now countries like China are investing a lot more than the US government. So, you know, if if we look at the the basis of a lot of these discoveries, even though there has been a scaling back, taxpayer dollars are still in the mix.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So I think that gives us a very clear political and moral claim to to how these drugs are priced. You know, if if my dollars went to support the basic research to develop this $400,000 cure, like, I need to have some kind of say in how it's being priced. It just just isn't fair.
Dr. Moira Gunn:And some benefit. Thank you. And some benefit.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Correct. Right. I I need to be able to access this. If I'm already paying for it with my taxes, like, I I deserve this treatment.
Dr. Moira Gunn:If I was a venture capitalist, I'd have it. I'm paying for it. Right. I should have some.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Right.
Dr. Moira Gunn:Now there's no doubt you gave for your research. And perhaps my favorite, I'm sorry, is you were visiting the Harmonicare Hospital in China to learn of their full range of medical services, Never mentioning doctor He, that's where his, his, laboratory was. See what you could learn. And he asked for a full checkup of your physical and reproductive health, not saying what was coming. Poor I have to say the room with the fake window and the incredible selection of videos, I was like, why am I laughing out loud at this book?
Dr. Moira Gunn:Oh my goodness. You know, most of us wouldn't have the nerve to try this. You know? But these are the kinds of things you get some very interesting inside information just experientially, if you will, by following these paths.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Yeah. For for starters, that place kinda looked like the Jetsons. You know. It it it had those, like, angular chairs, these oblong windows, and I I go to the facility not knowing, you know, if this was really part of the story or if it was just some red herring. So, So, you know, basically after doctor does this experiment, everybody who had helped out is trying to distance themselves and wash their hands and claim that they didn't have anything to do with it.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So this facility
Dr. Moira Gunn:Will be? Nothing. Yeah. Right. Right.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:You know, this facility with the Associated Press, cameras rolling, the director was saying this experiment is ethical. We gave approval for it. And, you know, days later they issue a press release like, oh, no. Like that, not didn't happen here. So so I'm just trying to figure out, for starters, is this a place where this experiment could have happened?
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Did they have an IVF clinic? And, you know, along the way, I I get a diagnosis of, my own reproductive health. It turns out, you know, I I will need some help if I'm in in my forties now, and, my sperm counts aren't what they used to be. But, you know, as as I get this diagnosis, she says, well, you know, there's other hospitals here in mainland China, that could help you, but, you might really consider reproductive tourism to Thailand. You know?
Dr. Eben Kirksey:As as an American, she recognizes health costs are high here and that there's very adequate facilities, in other parts of Asia. But, you know, it was this this journey where, I got a whole tour, and this this facility is is mind boggling. You know? It's it's kind of like a hotel boutique hospital clinic kind of place. It's, I also learned about conflicts that often emerge between, expatriates, like Americans who are living in China and their Chinese wives.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So there, it's pretty much expected that you hang out in the hospital for 30 days, and and you you need to be treated. Yeah. At
Dr. Moira Gunn:the ab, baby. Perfect.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Right. Yeah. The they had these, swimming classes for newborns. They had massage and yoga for for the moms. But what was really striking was the plastic surgery clinic.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:And, you know, this is a place where they're routinely doing skin lightening treatments, Asian eyelid removal, you know, all kinds of treatments aimed at creating a particular image of beauty. And, there's been some great scholarship, by by others looking at the geopolitics of beauty. You know? Why is it that that there's this whole cosmetic surgery industry in East Asia right now? And, you know, it it goes back to the Korean War when, American medical doctors offered as what they saw an act of beneficence.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:You know, this this surgery to remove, their helpers of of the Asian sleepy eye. But, you know, what we see is is a story of about colonialism. You know, who who gets to produce images of of the beautiful? So this hospital that that gave ethics approval for this experiment bills itself as creating bills itself as doing American medicine and only for you. And part of it is an image of whiteness.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:And, you know, imagining CRISPR entering the clinic in this place is is a recipe for those eugenic futures where, you know, like, there's an image of the Aryan race that is being promoted here. And and I must say, you know, it's it's a little more complicated than just, you know, let's all look like Brad Pitt or, you know, this this kind of image of beauty. Within East Asia, you know, having blonde hair or blue eyes would signal that you're a foreigner and that you don't have full rights of citizenship. But but nonetheless, there's a very similar kind of white privilege as as the sort of white privilege that people enjoy here. So I found it really troubling, you know, the this this sort of experiment that I had and and going to this this hospital, you know, poking around, seeing what was there, ultimately yielded something that I found deeply troubling.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:I I found that the ethical sensibilities and the values that were shaping the experiment were all about profit and had this strange, echo of of a colonial past as as they imagined a future for this technology.
Dr. Moira Gunn:Now what and in the run up to this interview, I discovered, you know, you're living in a sort of small abode, and I thought, oh, this looks just great. And I said, well, I built this cabin, I guess, small house, when COVID hit. It's like, what? Everybody just went home. Tell us tell us about the what you've this building you've built and, how you were able to do it in the middle of COVID.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:So so I finished the book, March 13th. So I was I was in Princeton, New Jersey in my office, you know, enjoying all the beautiful things that come with brick and mortar institutions, libraries, a cafeteria where you could go have wonderful cooked meals, you know, colleagues that you run into the into in the hallways and have conversations. My parents live in Maryland. My long term job is in Australia, and I was basically stranded in the US, by the pandemic. I've been bumped off of 2 flights.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:My my employer is still paying my salary, thankfully. And what what I did in in the pandemic is is basically build myself a tiny house they have a farm here in Maryland I'm on 40 acres I'm looking out on green pastures and blue skies so so it's been a great place to sort of socially isolate and, learn how to take care of chickens, goats, and, a whole, landscape full of butterflies, grasshoppers, and praying mantises. Some some of my favorite things that are around me.
Dr. Moira Gunn:How big is your tiny house?
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Let's see. It's it's big enough for a kitchen, some bookshelves, a little workstation, and then I built a a separate, place with a bathtub and a shower next door. So it's it's it's been a a fun little experiment. You know, I used to live in Brooklyn, and, this is about the size of a Brooklyn apartment.
Dr. Moira Gunn:But it's a whole lot different. Same size, too different places. Well, this has been terrific. I I I'm I'm no MD, just a PhD. And, of course, you know that even though your your, your your your sperm may have, you know, been reduced over time, Still be careful, sir.
Dr. Moira Gunn:Thank you. It only takes one. It only takes one of those guys. So I'm I you could be sitting there pontificating about ethics, but, you know, they got minds of their own. So, be please be careful.
Dr. Moira Gunn:And I do and do please we didn't get to a whole lot of things in the book. You see all the questions I have that we didn't get to, but I hope you'll come back and see us again.
Dr. Eben Kirksey:Yeah. I I definitely hope to. So thank you for having me on the show. It's been a real delight and pleasure to talk through these ideas and, look forward to future conversations.
Dr. Moira Gunn:My guest today is Eben Kirksey. The book is The Mutant Project, Inside the Global Race to Genetically Modify Humans. It's published by Saint Martin's Press.