In vitro fertilization is one of many procedures listed as a specialty in the field of reproductive medicine. Everything from treating pregnancy to aborting children to birth control to treating infertility is included. “Infertility” is the inability of a couple to achieve pregnancy the natural way. It is this condition that first generated the interest […]
My taskmasters at the CBC never allow me to rest on my laurels. Fresh off several years of stellar prognosticating, I am now forced to answer the question: “But what have you predicted, lately?” Okay, let’s take a look. Oh! Oh my. Please remember, the following predictions are what I see happening. They do not […]
Womb transplants are in the news again and I have seen a few posts around the Catholic blogosphere questioning what such a transplant might mean, ethically. First, some background: A womb transplant is exactly what it sounds like. Women who were either born without a uterus or have had their uterus removed after suffering cervical […]
While some European ethicists and politicians have called for an end to the creation of “three-parent” IVF embryos, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has announced it is considering allowing the practice – without having held a public consultation. Researchers say that the technique “modifies standard IVF technology” to create an embryo from the eggs of […]
We all know headlines are meant to sell news, so we are right to read articles through a discerning lens and even some healthy skepticism. We are also wise to consider the source. Is this a trusted reporter? Is this a reliable journal, paper, or author? You can imagine my sense of outrage when last […]
The short answer is we don’t know. But another news story is out on a study that raises more questions than it answers regarding the harm to children born via IVF. From the story: Children born as a result of IVF are a third more likely to get cancer, a major study found. Scientists said […]
The UK rubber stamp Embryo Authority has approved the manufacture of three-parent human embryos. The process is done by removing the nucleus from the egg of one woman, putting it into the enucleated egg of another, and then fertilizing with sperm. Voila, three biological parents. The approach is supposed to enable women with mitochondrial disease—who […]
In a recent New York Times editorial, Sarah Richards raised some provocative questions as to whether fertility treatment should be covered in divorce settlements. In her op-ed “Alimony for Eggs,” Richards profiles a New Jersey couple where the wife’s lawyer is arguing that the husband should pay $20,000 towards the wife’s egg freezing and storage […]
Miriam Zoll, author of the recent book Cracked Open: Liberty, Fertility and the Pursuit of High-Tech Babies, has a terrific piece in the New York Times on “Selling the Fantasy of Fertility” to those struggling with infertility. She’s co-written the piece with Pamela Tsigdinos, and their voices are important as they write from their personal […]
In modern times, skewing the image of the human being as a child of God, created in His image and likeness, is a process that started the day the first condom was sold in a vending machine early in the 1940s. While it is equally true that, since the beginning of time, man has tried by every means […]
“Imagine in a thousand years someone doing IVF with a long-frozen embryo just to see what a 21st century – or, in this case, 20th century – human being was like. Just keeping them frozen – kicking the can down the road a little farther – seems wrong to me. . . . If you […]
Good science fiction tells a morality tale about the dangerous directions in which contemporary society is heading. For example, Brave New World—perhaps the most prescient novel ever written—warned against the dystopian impact that using biotechnology to perfect the human race would have on society. Similarly, the Dune novels—which feature a breeding device known as an […]
You remember Julian Savulescu, the Oxford “ethicist” who is telling parents that we are morally obligated to choose the child among many “possible children” that is determined by genetic testing to have the “best life.” He wants us all to use IVF, whether we are infertile or not apparently, to create a batch of embryos […]
Yup, it’s them again. America’s most charming couple is back in the news. You remember, don’t you? We were introduced back in May when Albert Garland (a pseudonym), published a piece on Babble with the charming sub-headline: “My wife’s expecting twins — and I’m not happy about it.” Things only went downhill from there. Well, […]
In manufacturing, quality control (QC) is very important. A manufacturer always wants to put out the best product and eliminate defective merchandise. The same is true of IVF. With as many as 30 embryos created for every live birth, doctors are always on the look out for ways to separate the robust embryos from the […]
The Huffington Post must have known the publication of “My Wife Is Expecting Twins and I Am Not Happy About It” would cause waves. Tsunami-level waves, where people were aghast to read paragraphs like this one: Two blessings, two bundles of joy. How could you not be happy, you ask? Of course I’m sympathetic to […]
Many were in disbelief when a Planned Parenthood lobbyist from Florida, Alisa LaPoit Snow, suggested that babies born alive after abortion were nothing more than subject matter for decisions a mother should be able to make about whether or not her child should live. That act, were it to be performed, is being described as […]
A proposal by fertility researchers to “harvest” female gametes, “ova,” from the dead bodies of aborted children to create in vitro embryos in the lab has created a small buzz among the pro-life websites, blogs and Facebook in the last couple of days. But the buzz is over a story that appeared in the Daily […]
The decision is being called Latin America’s Roe v. Wade A few days before Christmas, the inter-American Court of Human Rights (IAHR Court) issued the worst judgment in its history. The case concerned Costa Rica’s law banning in-vitro fertilization, or IVF, but the judgment went far beyond this. The IAHR Court’s decision severely limited the […]
In Australia, IVF clinics are reporting that the number of older, single, heterosexual women using donor sperm to conceive a child has increased by 10% in the past three years. This trend is particularly pronounced in Victoria where it is no longer illegal for single women to undergo IVF if they are not medically infertile. They […]
We can all remember reading predictions that at some point mankind will become immortal. Perhaps we have heard that there are techniques afoot that will eliminate disease and make the human being into something superior to himself, thus redefining us as transhuman. This is not science fiction and it is no longer in the realm […]
The short answer to the very complex question posed in the title of this article is this: We actually don’t know, yet. That is to say that the official teaching body of the Catholic Church, the Magisterium, has not yet issued a final stance on this specific topic. The debate among Church theologians began in earnest […]
CBC President Jennifer Lahl interviews Alana S. Newman, the founder of the Anonymous Us Project about an event that took place in New York on October 1. Jennifer: Last week I received a Google alert telling me about a charity fundraising event in New York City to raise money for Gay men to have babies via reproductive technology […]
I have seen a lot of marginalization of children with artificial reproductive technologies, but I think this may take the cake. Never in my life have I encountered such a callous disregard for the health and well-being of a child that is so supposedly “wanted.” Two women have donated their wombs to their daughters. A […]
