Technology Assessment of Genome Editing
September 4, 2019

In a press conference organised on 28 August 2019 in Basel the Swiss-based foundation TA-SWISS presented the results of a technology assessment study which was conducted by an interdisciplinary Austrian-Swiss consortium. Armin Spök and Caroline Hammer, both members of the Science, Technology and Society Unit, were the TU Graz researchers involved.

The presentation was very timely, as the Swiss Parliament has recently started to explore the options and needs for legal action and policy development prompted by genome editing. In 2018 members of the consortium including Armin Spök were invited to the Swiss parliament to report in interim results of this study.

Genome editing encompasses a variety of molecular techniques allowing genetic modification of virtually all living beings with higher precision and at higher pace compared to conventional gene technology. Moreover, it allows minimal genetic modifications of e.g. in food crop plants - which at this point in time - cannot be distinguished from conventional breeding. The study investigated potential advantages of and challenges of applications of genome editing in human medicine, plant and animal breeding and for so called “gene-drives”. The latter are genetic elements which could very rapidly spread a desired genetic information in a population. This type of mechanisms could also be used to eradicate populations of carriers for disease such as Malaria.

The full study (in German language) can be ordered as a paper copy but is also available for free download as e-book version  at https://vdf.ch/genome-editing-interdisziplinare-technikfolgenabschatzung-e-book.htm. Abridged versions are also available in German, English, French and Italian language (for English see https://www.ta-swiss.ch/KF-Genome-Editing-en-19_Web.pdf).