Coming soon to the "genetic supermarket" near you

Recent medical studies have indicated that synthesized human growth hormone (hGH) may cosmetically enhance short, but otherwise perfectly healthy, individuals by adding inches to their final predicted height. In this note, Curtis Kin examines the legal and ethical implications of such a discovery, arguing that nontherapeutic hGH treatment is likely the first of many biotechnology and gene therapy enhancements that may be available to the public in a "genetic supermarket" of enhancement products. Mr. Kin finds that the current regulatory framework for biotechnology and gene therapy inadequately regulates unapproved uses of hGH and fails to address properly its implications for a genetic "race to perfection." He proposes changes to the current regulatory framework that will enforce a strict distinction between therapeutic and enhancement applications of biotechnology and gene therapy. These changes in the law, Mr. Kin reasons, will help to solve the social and ethical problems posed by these emerging developments in technology.     

Le pouvoir des coordonnateurs régionaux

Abstract. In some regions of Quebec, regional administrative conferences bring together coordinators from different departments. The oldest of these administrative conferences is the one in Eastern Quebec (Lower St. Lawrence and Gaspé). The coordinators' power, and therefore the efficiency of their actions, seems to depend on their status in the administrative organisation to which they belong. More specifically, two aspects of this status seem to play a determining role: the hierarchic distance between the coordinator and the deputy minister responsible for his department, and the importance of the coordinator's division. These two aspects of the coordinators' status are linked to their downward power in implementing decisions and to their upward power in preparing them. In order to explain a coordinator's power, one must also take into account the clients of the department and of the decentralized agencies under its authority, the cohesion of the division, and the personal skills of the coordinator. When all these elements are present and the coordinator is indeed a regional director, well placed in his department, the conditions for efficient action on his part are fulfilled.