令和５年度
琉球大学医学部医学科第２年次特別編入学（学士入学）
小論文 Ⅰ
９時００分〜 １０時３０分
注意

合図があるまで開いてはいけません。
本冊子は回収しますので、持ち帰らないで下さい。

受験番号と氏名を記載して下さい。
受 験 番 号
氏名1

１

キングス・カレッジ・ロンドン News Centre に掲載された海外ニュース（2021 年 2 月1 日）を抜粋、一部改変した英文を読み、解答用紙の設問に答えなさい。

Extend 14-day human embryo research limit to 28 days, urges ethicist
An ethicist from King's College London has urged to extend the legal limit on humanembryo research from 14 to 28 days.

The paper, published today in the Journal of Medical Ethics, argues it is now essential tocarry out research on later stage embryos in order to potentially find ways to develop
treatments to ward off the risks of recurrent miscarriage and developmental abnormalities.

※非公開

The ‘14-day rule’ limits research on intact human embryos to this period, as it is only
after 14 days that the central nervous system begins to develop. The law governing therule applies in many jurisdictions and is upheld even in countries without relevant laws
or guidelines.
**********************************************************************For the past 40 years, the 14-day rule has both governed and enabled embryo researchand therapeutic innovation globally. It has been a piece of legislation and a rule of goodpractice, defining a clear boundary in which valuable research has been able to proceedagainst some considerable opposition.（問 1）– Sophia McCully, from the Departmentof Global Health and Social Medicine**********************************************************************
But it is now safe and timely to make a policy change and extend the rule without fear of
any “moral and regulatory slippery slope,” she says.
McCully also argues that many studies suggest that important changes in the embryo that
occur before 14 days are likely to affect subsequent development. But without the ability
to go further, their real significance will be hard to understand.
There are arguably compelling reasons for mandating the extension of this rule to 28 days.
These include greater understanding of the development of birth defects such ascongenital heart disease, which affects around 8 in every 1000 babies; the potential to2

improve IVF（問 2）and reduce rates of miscarriage; and improved safety testing of newtechniques, such as mitochondrial replacement therapy.
Animal embryos can and are being used for up to 20 days, however it is not clear how
closely these resemble human embryo biology.

※非公開

She added: “Embryo research is a crucial undertaking and will help us to make manytransformational discoveries, thus extending this very arbitrary limit is an endeavour thatmust be achieved.”3

２

以下の英文を読み、設問に答えなさい。

A US man has become the first person in the world to get a heart transplant from agenetically-modified pig.
David Bennett, 57, is doing well three days after the experimental seven-hour procedurein Baltimore, doctors say. The transplant was considered the last hope of saving Mr
Bennett's life, though it is not yet clear what his long-term chances of survival are. "Itwas either die or do this transplant," Mr Bennett explained a day before the surgery. "Iknow it's a shot in the dark, but it's my last choice," he said.
Doctors at the University of Maryland Medical Center were granted a special
dispensation by the US medical regulator to carry out the procedure, on the basis that※非公開

Mr Bennett - who has terminal heart disease - would otherwise have died. He had been
deemed ineligible for a human transplant, a decision that is often taken by doctors when
the patient is in very poor health. The pig used in the transplant had been geneticallymodified to knock out several genes that would have led to the organ being rejected by
Mr Bennett's body, the AFP news agency reports.
For the medical team who carried out the transplant, it marks the culmination of yearsof research and could change lives around the world. Surgeon Bartley Griffith said thesurgery would bring the world "one step closer to solving the organ shortage crisis".
Currently 17 people die every day in the US waiting for a transplant, with more than
100,000 reportedly on the waiting list.
Dr Christine Lau, chair of the Department of Surgery at the University of Maryland
School of Medicine, was in the operating theatre during the surgery. "He's at more of arisk because we require more immunosuppression, slightly different than we would
normally do in a human-to-human transplant. How well the patient does from now is,
you know, it's never been done before so we really don't know," she told the BBC.
"People die all the time on the waiting list, waiting for organs. If we could use
genetically engineered pig organs they'd never have to wait, they could basically get anorgan as they needed it. Plus, we wouldn't have to fly all over the country at night-time
to recover organs to put them into recipients," she added.
The possibility of using animal organs for so-called xenotransplantation to meet thedemand has long been considered, and using pig heart valves is already common.
In October 2021, surgeons in New York announced that they had successfullytransplanted a pig's kidney into a person. At the time, the operation was the mostadvanced experiment in the field so far. However, the recipient on that occasion wasbrain dead with no hope of recovery.

4This watershed moment provides hope of a solution to the chronic shortage of donor
human organs. But there is still a long way to go to determine whether giving people
animal organs is the way forward. Pig hearts are anatomically similar to human hearts
but, understandably, not identical. It's not ideal, compared to swapping in a humandonor heart. But it is possible to plumb them in and get them working.
The bigger issue is organ rejection. These pigs are bred to lack genes that can cause
rejection. They are cloned with certain genes "knocked out" and reared until they reachan age where their organs are big enough to be harvested for transplantation. It is too
soon to know how Mr Bennett will fare with his pig heart. His doctors were clear thatthe surgery was a gamble. The risks are huge, but so are the potential gains.
Mr Bennett, however, is hoping his transplant will allow him to continue with his life.

※非公開

He was bedridden for six weeks leading up to the surgery, and attached to a machine
which kept him alive after he was diagnosed with terminal heart disease. "I lookforward to getting out of bed after I recover," he said last week. On Monday, Mr Bennett
was reported to be breathing on his own while being carefully monitored.
But exactly what will happen next is unclear. Mr Griffith said they were proceeding
cautiously and carefully monitoring Mr Bennett, while his son David Bennett Jr told theAssociated Press that the family were "in the unknown at this point". But he added: "Herealises the magnitude of what was done and he really realises the importance of it.""We've never done this in a human and I like to think that we, we have given him abetter option than what continuing his therapy would have been," Mr Griffith said. "Butwhether [he will live for] a day, week, month, year, I don't know."（BBC NEWS, January 11, 2022より抜粋）
問1 この文章で述べられている治療法を、150字以内で要約せよ。
問2 この治療法の「利点」と「問題点」を、それぞれ100字以内で述べよ。

5