There is a difference between having defective genes (which everyone has) and not having the potential to contribute to society as a whole. I am talking about things like various forms of spina bifida where the average cost over a lifetime, for medical expensive is something like half a million. Oftentimes the children have a variety of other diseases, in addition to a lower IQ. Other than the value they have to their family a child born with these problems who is going to die at 15 does not give anything to the world.

I have never bought into the idea that all life is sacred. I think our world and humanity as a whole is sacred. And honestly I am comfortable saying that some people's lives are worth more than others. Why do people think that is so wrong? Are you saying if there were two people in a room and one had to die or they both would you couldn't make a decision? If one was someone dedicated to helping others and the other a rapist? You would think both should die then since you can't say one life has more value than the other?

The thing I don't get is do people not realize that at some point these judgment calls are going to have to be made? Our world is overburdened - something has to give. Apparently the vast majority people would prefer to just let the Earth crash.

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Economists do it all the time when performing cost-benefit analyses. It's necessary because, while plugging infinity into the equations (i.e. life is 'priceless') makes us feel much better about ourselves, the implication is that any infinitesimal improvement that could be made to safety, no matter what the cost, is "worth" it.

The problem is that's not feasible. We have scarce resources. We have to peg lives at a dollar amount just so we can make realistic decisions about the resources we do have.

Or, instead of looking at the finances, look at another scarce resource that DS people would consume disproportionately: organs for transplant. It's already been stated that DS frequently need surgeries to correct physical defects such as heart malformations. Are they worth five heart transplants? Fourteen kidney transplants? Especially given the low organ donation rate and the waiting lists? Are you willing to let healthier patients die so that a DS person who's likely to come down with Alzheimer's or other conditions in aa few years anyway get those scare organs.

Our current health care system in the US hides the opportunity costs of such decisions, thus allowing us to avoid the really tough ones by simply letting an invisible hand do the dirty work. But such a system is not really sustainable, and we're already starting to see it break down. However, any alternative will require deciding rather exactly how much various lives are worth.

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(1) If you think doctors (and other in the medicine) aren't taking costs into consideration when they make those kinds of decisions, you've got another think coming. The (non-DS) brother-in-law of one of my girlfriends is dead because the doctors realized that his financial situation meant he couldn't afford the anti-rejection drugs that would allow him to have an organ transplant. Author Terry Pratchett is being denied Arciept by Britain's NHS of the cost versus the benefit. It happens everyday; it's just not talked about because people would rather pretend that life is priceless and we'll never run out of the things we need.

(2) Life span for people with DS is most certainly not a non-issue, or have you forgotten that, thanks to some basic medical advances in the past century, DS people are living longer than ever before? That's how some of the later-age mental and physcal problems resulting from DS have come to be discovered--they used to die before the problems ever manifested.

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The whole idea that people with Downs syndrome don't contribute is a little out of touch. There has been a huge push to employs Downs adults in entry level jobs in post office, grocery stores, etc. Very simple jobs that are also necessary.

And resources? I understand the comparison with spina bifida, but its not as though people with Downs syndrome use up more electricity or something. They MAY need extra medical attention, but so may any other fetus.

This whole "We should abort babies with Downs!" argument makes no sense. It isn't the 5,000 Downs babies born in the US that are increasing the strain on our natural resources, its large scale population expansion and increased quality of living in the developing world and the continued refusal of the US to meet basic environmental standards.

We are no where near the point of killing people for resources, but if we are every at that point, I'd like the eugenicists to sacrifice themselves for the greater good.

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Yeah, like David Crosby. Or Larry Hagman.

And welcome to the Breast Cancer Gene Club, by the way. I'm a member, too. Just buried my mother two years ago.

My point is, you don't have the same crap shoot as the DS person. With your health problems, your odds are way, way better. You're already living in a near-Gattaca future because decisions like what I've been talking are already being made around you, without your direct involvement, and you've already benefited from them.

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I will also point out that there are plenty of DS children awaiting adoption, and I notice that while a lot of people in this discussion are convinced that DS is all rainbows and unicorns, no one seems to be interested in taking one in.

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There are a lot of older children and children of color also waiting for adoption, but the fact that no one adopted them doesn't mean they are less than white infants. Adoption is a lot more complicated than you make it seem.

No not every person with Down Syndrome is employable, but lots and lots of people with Downs syndrome are. My local grocery store has a few workers with Down syndrome, my co-worker's brother works in the post office. Frequently unemployment has more to do with bias and opportunities than ability.

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