People who are anti abortion from conception, how do you feel about IVF?

One thing I noticed both during our ivf process and afterwards was the automatic assumption that a fertility issue would be female based. I wonder if this is literally an idea left over from medieval times.
I often wanted to say that the only fertility issue I had could be solved by having sex with another guy, but I didn't.
The idea of 30 viable embryos being discarded pp sounds completely unrealistic to me I don't know a single person who got anywhere near that level.
Non viable ones just don't develop.

I get that the debate has been going on for time indeterminate whether conception is at the point of fertilization or implantation.

I won't quote your whole post because it's long, and you know what it says anyway. I couldn't quite follow what you were getting at in parts, like a period being an abortion. I don't think that's a common viewpoint.

In any case as far as I know there is no controversy here. Fertilisation is conception. Pregnancy begins at implantation. The reason Catholics believe that personhood begins at conception rather than implantation is because that is when you have a separate, complete human organism, albeit at a very early stage of development. It's not part of the mother, in the way that a leg or a tooth is.

@Carowiththegoodhair you may be interested in the Fertility Education Initiative, a programme of work dedicated to improving knowledge of fertility and reproductive health in the UK

Menstrual health and understanding your cycles is also going to be part of the national curriculum from 2020

Not RTFT but I am against IVF because of the industrial creation and destruction of embryos. In average for every baby born, 30 embryos will be destroyed.

There is also the entire “Frankenstein” element to it, I don’t believe enough is known about the potential effects on future generations. This is still a new technology.

That said to anyone upset by this thread. I cannot imagine the pain of infertility.

It seems as though IVF is a very inefficient sticking plaster which doesn’t cure the underlying causes of infertility but seeks to circumvent them.

I would like to see stacks more research into infertility and a lot more education of young girls/women in terms of identifying their own natural cycles. Very often problems can be flagged early and solutions like hormone treatment sought.

I also would like to see a radical shift in society whereby women are encouraged to think about their fertility sooner, to maybe partner up and have families while they are younger with still all the opportunities of university & a fulfilling career available to them. At the moment women are shoved through a sausage factory designed around men, who can procreate at any time!

PS I was interviewed by Jane Garvey on WH and I reckon she is deffo GC! I thanked her on behalf of MN for how she handled the trans debates 👍🏻

Also may be interested to note that the Dr leading the Abuse in ART project is Prof Susan Bewley, who was the co author of some recent contributions to the Lancet, BMJ and BJGP expressing concerns about GIDS and lack of evidence for puberty blockers long term safety etc. She is ACE.

@LassOfFyvie with pleasure, will happily share what I can

No worries about outing, this username is the same as my twitter and instagram handles, the URL of my website and the title of the book I'm writing, so I'm easy enough to identify ;)

I've written about my experience of infertility and pregnancy loss for the Guardian, and discussed it on Woman's Hour and 5Live so anything I put out there is v much public

If I can I'll try and tweet highlights on the day, depending on what's allowed. It might be Chatham House rules so may not be able to report back with much - will see what I can do.

Embryo drop off is immense and a v stark reminder of how staggeringly inefficient humans are as a species when it comes to reproduction

The quantity of eggs produced depends on the protocol used and the woman's ovarian reserve. Both quantity and quality decline with age

Not all eggs retrieved will be mature - only mature eggs are capable of being fertilised.

There's no way to tell which eggs are good quality (& worth fertilising) and which are poor & unlikely to be able to make a baby. If you have a larger haul than expected and for whatever reason don't want to risk ending up with surplus embryos you can opt to fertilise some eggs & freeze (or discard) the others, but it's pot luck whether you select decent ones or not

Not all mature eggs will fertilise - this is primarily determined by egg quality. Fertilisation rate varies but approx 75% is considered decent. Unless you have sperm issues, doing ICSI (where the embryologist injects a single sperm cell directly into the egg) doesn't increase fertilisation rates vs conventional IVF (put eggs and sperm in a dish together and they self inseminate)

Not all 2PN embryos will make it to cleavage stage (day 3)

The biggest drop off is typically between day 3 and day 5, when the embryo develops rapidly from cleavage stage (4-6 cells) to blastocyst, a much more complex embryo where the cells have started to differentiate - the inner cell mass (the bit that hopefully becomes fetus) and the trophectoderm (the outer bit that hopefully becomes placenta)

Drop off can vary - if ~50% of day 3 embryos make it to blast that's considered decent

Of those embryos that make it to blastocyst the % that have the potential to become a person is primarily driven by age

This image shows how egg quality declines with age meaning fertility declines and likelihood of miscarriage increases

images.app.goo.gl/BYvQpNbNby9gyqj8A

Across 3 egg collections I had 55 eggs retrieved, of which 45 were mature, of which 35 fertilised, of which 14 made it to blast - of which genetic screening showed 7 were chromosomally normal (of which I miscarried 2, due to uterine issues, and have 5 left on ice). I was 34 when we made our embryos.

Prof Robert Winston once remarked that humans are almost - but not quite - as inefficient at reproduction as pandas

I realise (having RTFT) that the thread has moved on, but as the OP was looking for prolifers: I'm pro-life and yes, I don't believe in IVF, abortion, contraception, euthanasia etc. As pp have said, the IVF issue is not wholly about the destruction of the leftover embryos, so even if this possibility were eliminated I would still not be in favour of it.

I don't do much to impose these views on others or harass people who make different decisions. I rarely bring it up IRL except when specifically asked.

It's important to state that even though I'm against all these things, I do not view them all as morally equally.

To the pp who was asking about stem cell research: most stem cell research is done on adult stem cells, and that is morally good (not just neutral). Yes, many Catholics try to avoid products developed from research on embryonic stem cells, however this is increasingly hard to determine because the information is not available. Most moral theologians suggest that the possibility of embryonic stem cells having been used in R&D is sufficiently remote from the actual medicines/ therapy developed that Catholics can use these in good conscience. It would be different if the pharmaceutical companies were more open about how and where they had used embryos, then a lot more Catholics would boycott particular products.

I can't apologise for how you feel. You used a procedure which is legal in this country. You are entitled to find my views offensive but I am entitled to hold them and express them.

I have no religious beliefs at all but IVF has always had a Frankenstein element to it - an "I want, therefore I must have" no matter what ethical or unforeseen consequences might result
This is really offensive to those of us who have been through the difficult process of IVF. It is certainly not undertaken lightly. I have found this whole thread really upsetting tbh.

uberbarrensclub

That looks really interesting. Would it be possible, without outing yourself (and giving away copyrighted lecture materials) to post about what was discussed after the event?

I mainly believe in working to create a society where continuing with an unexpected pregnancy carries no stigma whatever your circumstances

The vast majority of unexpected pregnancies in what I would loosely describe as the "western world" do not carry a stigma. That is not why women have abortions. In countries where unexpected pregnancies carry a stigma abortion is unlikely to be safely or legally available.

I mainly believe in working to create a society where continuing with an unexpected pregnancy carries no stigma whatever your circumstances
The vast majority of abortions aren't because of stigma. If you have been raped you don't think I don't want this baby because her at number 43 will judge me. If you have already 3 kids with debilitating medical conditions you don't abort a forth pregnancy because Aunty Doris might not approve. There are 100s of reasons that women decide to end a pregnancy I doubt the stigma is a factor for most of them.

(This thread is v interesting and v timely as many of the issues raised are actually on the agenda for a seminar (funded by the Institute of Medical Ethics) about 'Defining Abuse in Assisted Reproductive Technology' involving academics from bioethics, medicine, social science, anthropology, history and human rights law. (Disclosure - I'm also one of the speakers at the event, supposedly as a 'patient activist')

Hoping it should be an interesting day, tackling some difficult and controversial issues

To be clear I was replying to StopThePlanet but there are intervening posts.

I was unaware that conception was a contested term. Does it not really have any particular medical meaning?

Everything in your post is irrelevant to my objection to IVF.

I thought IVF at the time of the first "test tube" baby was the start of a slippery slope of unnecessary and unjustified procedures.

We now have surrogacy where the egg can be taken from a woman who will never be legally or socially "the mother". The woman carrying the foetus is, in the UK, anyway at least temporarily, legally the mother. She might or might not be the permanent social mother. The majority opinion on here is that surrogacy is wrong- but surrogacy led directly from IVF. The latest "progress" in novel ways to create babies is womb transplants- what next? Artificial wombs? And why? It's not as if we are running short of people.

I have no religious beliefs at all but IVF has always had a Frankenstein element to it - an "I want, therefore I must have" no matter what ethical or unforeseen consequences might result. "I want, therefore I must have" is an attitude which infects society in all manner of ways and I don't think it is good. Just because something can be done, doesn't mean it should be done.

I think there is hypocrisy by those who are anti-abortion but who support IVF. Clearly from the US perspective it's all about money- IVF is a very expensive process involving expensive drugs so exceptions will be made.

As I've said before my view is the other way round from what the OP probably expected. I support the right to have an abortion. My view is abortion is the lesser of 2 bad situations and the woman's rights trumps the foetus. IVF on the other hand, as far as I'm concerned, is turning embryos into commodities.

Germany's Embryo Protection Act is fiendishly complicated - but has huge grey areas (and loopholes). The Act itself is highly restrictive but whilst the guidelines try to avoid the creation of surplus embryos, there are no specific rules on how to manage surplus embryos that are created

If any fertility nerds are interested these will get you banged up in Germany:

The Embryo Protection Act (Embryonenschutzgesetz) of 13 December 1990, section 1, provides that certain acts of improper use of reproductive technology are punishable with up to three years' imprisonment or a fine, namely:

Transferring to a woman an unfertilized egg cell produced by another woman (subsection 1, no. 1)

The attempt to artificially inseminate an egg cell for any purpose other than achieving pregnancy in the woman from whom the egg cell originated (subsection 1, no. 2)

The attempt to transfer within one treatment cycle more than three embryos to a woman (subsection 1, no. 3)

The attempt to fertilize by gamete intrafallopian transfer more than three egg cells within one treatment cycle (subsection 1, no. 4)

The attempt to fertilize more egg cells from a woman than may be transferred to her within one treatment cycle (subsection 1, no. 5)

The removal of an embryo from a woman before completion of implantation in the uterus in order to transfer it to another woman or to use it for another purpose not serving its preservation (subsection 1, no. 6)

The attempt to carry out the artificial insemination of a woman who is prepared to give up her child permanently after birth (surrogate mother) or to transfer a human embryo to her (subsection 1, no. 7)

The artificial penetration of a human egg cell by a human sperm cell or the transfer of a human sperm cell into a human egg cell artificially without the intention to achieve pregnancy in a woman from whom the egg cell originated (subsection 2)

https://biopolicywiki.org/index.php?title=Germany

I'm not anti abortion for anyone else, but am very strongly for myself and if I did need IVF to have children I would only do it if there was no egg fertilised that wouldn't be given an attempt.

In Switzerland embryo cryopreservation was banned until "a revised law came into effect in September 2017, and this now allows patients to have up to 12 embryos frozen. These can remain in storage for up to ten years, whereupon they are destroyed."

Human fertility and embryology legislation around the world is very much influenced by the religious context in different countries

Poland, for example, as a Catholic country, "restricts the number of oocytes that can be fertilised at six, unless there is a well-documented condition that affects success, or a couple has had two or more unsuccessful attempts."

Their law around frozen embryos is highly proscriptive - it "does not allow embryo destruction to take place, and surplus embryos cannot be used in research. All unused embryos should be used in treatment – if not for the original couple, then via anonymous donation. Embryos can be donated to other couples voluntarily, or can be cryopreserved for up to 20 years. If the legal maximum of 20 years in cryopreservation is reached, then the embryos will be donated to another couple mandatorily. Destruction of an embryo is an offence punishable with imprisonment, for a period ranging from six months to five years."

www.bionews.org.uk/page_140839

@JoJoSM2 apols, not RTFT fully so may have missed this if it's already been mentioned, but some people opt for compassionate transfer for leftover embryos as an alternative to embryo adoption, donating them to scientific research or discarding them

Compassionate transfer is the process of transferring remaining embryos into the uterus of a woman when it is highly unlikely to result in pregnancy. The general rationale for such a procedure is that a woman is “open” to the potentiality that these embryos could implant and therefore it is less morally problematic than intentionally destroying these embryos or leaving them frozen indefinitely. Moreover, proponents argue that the embryo’s passing is more akin to a miscarriage compared to an intentional destruction of the embryo

http://www.voicesinbioethics.net/newswire/2017/2/17/sw388nseb7x0o0e0odngdp5q3m0yg1

I would describe myself as a 'choose lifer'. So I personally would not have an abortion. I mainly believe in working to create a society where continuing with an unexpected pregnancy carries no stigma whatever your circumstances. DH and I also agreed that we would adopt rather than go for IVF if we were unable to conceive.

I get that the debate has been going on for time indeterminate whether conception is at the point of fertilization or implantation.

I posit this:

If conception is at fertilization then every fertilized egg (zygote) traveling in a fallopian tube or floating around a uterus = pregnancy; and we know that isn't the case. Pregnancy begins when an embryo implants. We don't say we had a miscarriage when we have our menses - a fertilized or (more likely) unfertilized egg is discarded by our bodies every month. I don't mourn my discarded eggs (fertilized or not) due to menses - do you?

The idea that our bodies discard/abort a 'possible pregnancy/child' (i.e. zygote/fertilized egg) via menses is contrived and stinks of patriarchy IMO. I was taught fertilized egg = conception as a Roman Catholic girl. It casts us as people with inherently evil bodies and minds - bodies that kill innocents without our control, and minds that manipulate men into sin. Women whose bodies achieve giving birth are raised for giving life in light of their sinful existence yet are still merely vessels for the next manchild (double entendre yes).

I rejected the fertilization = conception concept when my mom explained (with medical diagrams) the female reproductive organs and their functions. This discussion was a pre-menses talk to proactively comfort me with my soon-to-be changing body.

Placenta is required for embryo growth and development. We don't produce high levels of HCG at fertilization as this spike in production comes from the placenta (which is formed beginning with implantation by the embryo burrowing into the uterus wall). Women normally have a level of5mIU/mL or less of HCG in their system when not pregnant and a level exceeding 25 mIU/mL of HCG when pregnant. HCG spike is what pregnancy tests look for to determine if a woman is pregnant. If an embryo does not implant and produce placenta it is no longer viable. If implantation happens in the wrong place (ectopic pregnancy) the embryo is not viable. Ectopic pregnancies are used in the abortion debate as removal is considered abortion.

Menses and ectopic pregnancy are not miscarriage or abortion, can we agree on that?

How can conception begin at fertilization if the above is true?

If you hold fertilization = conception due to religious beliefs, do you believe your deity(-ies) would breathe unique life/soul/spirit into zygotes (single cell organisms upon fertilization) for most of them to die before birth?

My questions are not meant to be ugly, sarcastic, or pointed.

Since they love to harass women into continuing a pregnancy and placing their child for adoption instead of aborting it, shouldn't they be lobbying for those who have struggled with having children to adopt some of those kids instead of creating new ones?

Why the negativity? I've never harassed anyone. I also think that having biological children and adopting are two different things. Having or not having biological children has very little to do with wanting or not wanting to adopt.