Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/975483
10 maltatoday SUNDAY 29 APRIL 2018 News AN ideologue of the Nationalist Party under Eddie Fenech Adami, Fr Peter Serracino Inglott had made a moral case for embryo freezing 13 years ago. More controversially, he also made a case for unclaimed frozen embryos to be given up for thera- peutic stem cell research. The controversial thoughts of the philosopher priest, who passed away in 2012, can be found in the transcripts of Parliament's social affairs committee. Fr Peter was one of the experts invited by the committee in 2005 to give his views on in-vitro ferti- lisation. The committee, then chaired by Nationalist MP Clyde Puli, now the PN secretary general, was the first to put a spotlight on IVF, genetic research and the need to regulate the sector. It held 21 meetings on the matter and invit- ed various experts to share their views. Until then, IVF was only offered at Saint James hospital, a private facility, which had pioneered the treatment in Malta. The country had no law regulating the sector. In the committee hearing held on 7 February 2005, Fr Peter spoke of the ethical dimension of IVF, embryo freezing, stem cell re- search and whether the treatment should be available to unmarried couples. And the priest made some state- ments that were miles ahead of the position eventually adopted by the PN in subsequent years. Freedom and justice "It is important in this field not to be more Catholic than the Pope because even theologians like St Thomas make it clear that if every sin were to become a crime and be prohibited by the law, the result would be tyranny," Fr Peter said as he outlined the principle that the State should not legislate on the basis of Catholic morality. He urged MPs to go for the least regulation possible, insisting the overriding principle should be freedom of choice. By this he was not advocating for abortion, although he did concede at one point during the hearing that abortion in the case of rape was a very strong argument, even if he did not agree with it. At the time, assisted procrea- tion was completely unregulated in Malta despite IVF having been available for quite some time in the private sector. Fr Peter consid- ered this to be an injustice. He argued that any legisla- tion should be enacted to fix the "anomaly" by making IVF avail- able in public hospitals but he was less convinced of the need for a law to protect embryos. "There may be the need, al- though I am not so convinced about this, for legislation to pro- tect embryos… there may be living creatures threatened by certain practices… but any legisla- tion should not go beyond what is necessary to stop abuse," Fr Peter advocated. Scientists not legislators While he argued for a minimal- ist but precise law, Fr Peter also cautioned against legislation that was too technical in a field of rapid technological advancement. Prescribing at law how many embryos could be created could hamper the treatment's success if science suggested that more em- bryos were necessary, or fail to do justice with scientific progress if this made it possible to fertilise fewer eggs, he said. Such decisions, he believed, should not be made by ethicists or legislators but by people with sci- entific competence. Stem cell research While advocating against the creation of unnecessary embryos, Fr Peter said he saw no moral ob- jection to the use of unclaimed embryos in stem cell research for therapeutic purposes. "I can imagine a situation where- by some of the unnecessary em- bryos being produced abroad… be brought to Malta and used for ex- periments to determine whether stem cells can be used for thera- peutic treatments. I find no moral objection to this and see no reason why it should be prohibited." Embryo freezing He also argued against a ban on embryo freezing, insisting this was not equivalent to killing. "When you freeze an embryo, you are not killing it, but putting it in a state where over a length of time it can degenerate. This means that life is being put at risk, but there is no absolute obligation to preserve life," Fr Peter said. He drew an important distinc- tion between the obligation not to destroy human life and the less onerous obligation to ensure its continued survival. There was an absolute moral obligation not to kill innocent people and this, he argued, should be prohibited by the law because the action violates the individual's fundamental human rights. But preserving life and ensuring its continual survival, was another matter altogether, he noted. Fr Peter cited as an example the situation of a patient who required extraordinary medical treatment to survive. "You are never obliged to utilise those extraordinary means… you can also take decisions that reduce the chances for life to be preserved by refusing to accept the treat- ment. Although the preservation of life is a serious obligation, it is not an absolute principle," Fr Pe- ter told MPs. Prudence not the State's remit While acknowledging the ar- guments of those who insisted that extra embryos should not be Regulating in-vitro fertilisation was on the agenda of a parliamentary committee 13 years ago when MPs heard a priest justify embryo freezing. KURT SANSONE goes back to the transcripts of that hearing The late Fr Peter Serracino Inglott, one of Malta's foremost ideologues and minds: he said the State's obligation is to protect freedom and not to regulate for prudence A moral justification for embryo freezing KURT SANSONE