The Limitations of “Therapy (Allowed) Versus Enhancement (Forbidden)”

A common theme that resulted from the Reflexive Thematic AnalysisReflexive thematic analysis (RTA) (RTA) method applied to selected WHOWorld Health Organization (WHO) and Humanity +  texts is human genome editingHuman genome editing for healthHealth, well-being, and enhancement. Enhancement BioethicsBioethics is tasked with constructing a better framework for the ethical analysis of interventions. This chapter highlights the limitations of the “therapyTherapy (allowed) versus enhancement (forbidden)” paradigm and moves towards defining a more coherent bioethical framework. Firstly, it considers the problem caused by equivocal concepts such as healthHealth, the goals of medicineMedicine, enhancement, and normalcy. Subsequently, this chapter analyses some aspects that weaken “therapy versus enhancement”, such as the goal of disease preventionPrevention (claimed by both therapyTherapy and enhancementEnhancement), the improvement in quality of life for the elderly (above the average for this age), and some commonly used enhancements. Lastly, this chapter acknowledges the weakest point of “therapy versus enhancement” as a criterion for morality. Ethical reasoning based exclusively on intentions lacks consistency and may cause significant harm in some cases while missing morally good or neutral improvements in other cases.