PETITION TO AMEND THE NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH 
GUIDELINES FOR RESEARCH INVOLVING RECOMBINANT DNA MOLECULES 
TO ESTABLISH A HUMAN EUGENICS ADVISORY COMMITTEE 
By The 
FOUNDATION ON ECONOMIC TRENDS, ET AL . . 
November 4, 1988 
The Foundation on Economic Trends ("Foundation") and Jeremy 
Rifkin hereby petition the National Institutes of Health ("NIH") 
to amend its NIH Guidelines for Research Involving Recombinant 
DNA Molecules to provide for a Human Eugenics Advisory Committee 
( "HEAC" ) of equal and parallel stature to that of the NIH 
Recombinant DNA Advisory Committee ("RAC") to review and make 
recommendations on all proposals involving human gene therapy. 
By human gene therapy, we mean to include proposals involving 
somatic cell therapy as well as those involving germ line 
therapy . 
As is evident from the recent submission of a human gene 
transfer protocol to the RAC by Drs. Steven A. Rosenberg, R. 
Michael Blaese and W. French Anderson of the NIH (53 Fed. Reg. 
34,246, 34,247 (Sept. 2, 1988)), involving the use of genes to 
mark tumor infiltrating lymphocytes (TIL) , the techniques for 
human genetic engineering are now being developed. As we 
understand the research in question, the tumor infiltrating 
lymphocytes (TIL) obtained from the patient's tumors are presumed 
to be the patient's own cancer-fighting cells. They are infused 
back into a vein of the patient. They are thought to circulate 
through the body and find, invade and kill cancer cells. There 
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