Vulnerabilità e tecnologie biomediche: il caso del genome editing germinale

Germline editing regulation finds itself at the centre of the contemporary bioethical-legal debate. In particular, the CRISPR-Cas9 gene-editing technique, with which the gene sequences of living organisms can be modified with relative ease and considerable accuracy, and without incurring great costs, raises questions both old and new that all stem from a concern about the caution needed before proceeding to rewrite the genome of any living being. This contribution presents a few normative remarks that might enable us to integrate the traditional precautionary approach, typically accompanying the use of emerging biotechnologies, with a paradigm based on vulnerability, understood as a normative gauge by which to manage risk and identify forms of regulation that in the future may contemplate gene editing on embryos for research and clinical purposes.