Womb Transplants

[SweetSouls]

I’ve noticed an increase online in the discussion of the possibility of womb transplants for trans women, to allow them to be pregnant and give birth to children.

This is increasingly presented as something in the very near future, largely because of the success of womb transplants into women.

Is this at all realistic? Presumably the mechanics are slightly more complicated than ‘just’ needing a womb transplant, and will this become an ethical debate?

I can’t quite wrap my head around it - mainly because I’d never considered it achievable.

How many women would have to donate eggs for the vast amount of research/trials for this, how many embryos would fail to implant while they try to tinker with complex hormonal/immunological processes. How many miscarriages/stillbirths/fetal abnormalities would they consider an acceptable consequence of this research, what is an acceptable level of potential harm to children’s development (physical and brain) with all the drugs and hormones they would be exposed to? Just to validate someone, while unexplained fertility and recurrent miscarriage in women is still so poorly understood. I can’t see this would ever get approval.

In terms of eggs that have been donated to research and existing embryos in cold storage I think it is possible.

We know embryos are 'adopted' and eggs that aren't used can be released for research with their 'owners' permission.

I think it's 5 live births that have been born from uterus transplants to women, and the technique which seems to originate from Brazil I think it is, requires anti-rejection drugs and the organ is removed after the birth. It's too soon to know the long term affect, if any.

I would hope it wouldn't get tried in men but I wouldn't put it last them. I think medical ethics in different countries differs and as Thingybob says it's completely fine according to the Drs as it's just helping a physically deficient woman who happens to have a male body.

It just isn't going to happen, however much TW might want it. Just as a woman couldn't sustain a functioning penis and testes if they were grafted onto her. The whole female system plays a part in gestating a baby.

It would be an implant, not a transplant. A transplant is replacing an existing organ; an implant is inserting a new device.

Getting the language right is crucial.

There is still so much about pregnancy they don't understand so how will they ever replicate it.
Not going to happen and sadly a lie that is being peddled to the trans community to make them believe they will be a ‘full woman’.

Also, where will the wombs come from? A lot of women don't want their wombs to go to men, and would rather opt out of organ donation than allow that to happen

I think you're underestimating the power of the indoctrination on women of 'being nice'.

Women already welcome men into their sports categories and shit on other women who complain, so they can be nice.

Women vote for policies that favour men over women in political parties so they can be nice.

Women have voted for a boycott on other prominent women standing for sex based rights so they can appear to be nice

Women happily become surrogates for infertile couples so they can be nice

Women are happy to be inseminated, gestate, and give birth to babies for gay couples in order to be nice

Of course women will happily give permission for their wombs to be donated to 'non-cervix havers' to be nice. They absolutely will. I have no illusions about that.

As regards womb transplants, I was reading about children conceived through anonymous sperm donation and the trauma some experienced as adults (with no father or link to their genetic history) and learned how profit driven and big business the fertility industry is. There has been a lot of unethical behaviour with regards to letting women donating overreach the limit on taking hormones for harvesting eggs (increasing risk for ovarian cancer) the amount of times men can donate sperm, the amount of eggs transplanted in women's wombs at one time, the gathering of data regarding health status of donors, and more. The welfare of children doesn't figure highly, more the end result - baby (in any form) = success.

I could see this happening and a lot of money being poured into it as a growth sector.

Yes a lot more than a womb is needed, but gender reassignment 'medicine' or 'treatment' is already as extreme as it gets and it always surprises me that some are happy to go through it with all the pain that it entails. Remove some ribs and inflate the pelvic cavity, inject regular nutrients and hormones, with anti-rejection drugs....I'm speculating obviously but this would be the wet dream of some highly intelligent and acclaimed scientists and endocrinologists.

I once sat in a lecture as a female scientist working within the field of robotics got excited and waxed lyrical about how great it would be when fully responsive sex robots were seen as viable. Objectification of the female form didn't appear to be something she was bothered about. I know these sorts of people will do anything to make a name for themselves. So I do think in this case it could happen sooner than we think. Some scientists have no scruples and simply hearing 'I am depressed' is all the guilt appeasement they need.

Also one thought, but isn't it true that a very tiny number of babies are born outside the womb cavity due to some anomaly? Gestating instead in the fallopian tube or just outside the womb altogether? It's very dangerous and rare to survive and always requires medical intervention, but I have read of cases detailed in womens mags like this. My point is that these incidents can be learned from in making it viable for men. Maybe.

It’s fucking crazy. Science has a very poor understanding of how pregnancy works even in women.

There would be zero cases of infertility or miscarriage in women if medical science advanced to the point of making pregancy possible in men (it won’t. Their bones are wrong, their hormones are wrong, their brains are wrong, their immune systems are wrong, they’re built wrong top to bottom for sustaining a pregnancy.) Come to that all autoimmune diseases would be a solved problem.

We’ll find a cure for death and aging before male pregnancy is possible - I really think it’s a much more trivial problem!

I somehow don’t think there would be any problem finding the money to fund such research, and I’m almost in favour of it being carried out because medical science might actually make some useful advances that help pregnant women if they were doing it for men. But I doubt such research would be conducted in an ethical manner.

IIIRC the lead “researcher” at Imperial is a plastic surgeon who does MTF surgeries, so essentially all the talk and publicity surrounding male uterus implants is functioning as advertising for him. My understanding is that the “research” has consisted of a survey asking MTF individuals if they’d like to have a uterus implant.

We're surely closer to being able to create an embryo without sperm to gestate in a woman than to reproducing in uteruses transplanted into men though, aren't we?

They've been able to do this in mice since the 90's. For some mysterious reason no one has ever invested the cash or time into making this feasible for humans, despite the obvious value for lesbian couples or infertile women.

And if course there is the small matter of where these wombs would come from - dead women? Poor women? Exploited women?

My understanding is that the “research” has consisted of a survey asking MTF individuals if they’d like to have a uterus implant.

The questions are all detailed in the linked thread from 2019 where the OP signed up to take the survey.

Good point, all. We can't yet ensure a successful pregnancy in women.

It worries me that this will end up falling under the opt-out organ donation scheme somehow.

However, womb transplants into males are a long way off yet, and I’m optimistic in that time the ‘gender’ bubble will have well and truly burst.

I'll write what I wrote before. This business of uterine transplants into men appears to be about science but it is not. It's about getting the idea out there that men can give birth too, but not just yet, there are a few technical details to be sorted out first. So while we're waiting for the inevitable, let's get on with the social sciences side of things and accept that since men can give birth too (not yet, but soon, soon, it's bound to happen), then there are no real differences between men and women in terms of things that are material and significant, they're just bodies with an interchangable set of parts. The actual differences are surface ones like the chosen forms of appearance.

It is about trying to change how people think by assuming a medical horror is a run-of-the-mill thing just round the corner. It's Overton Window stuff, not science.

The entitlement of these people is so utterly grotesque. The animal suffering required for testing, the risk to the foetus, the waste of medical resources - to give some mythical sense of being 'truly' a woman. Which is ironic because apparently talking about the biological reality of being a woman is reductive and exclusionary when it doesn't suit the trans narrative.

Can't see it ever happening. It's the realms of sci fi.
On the other hand, people talked about the fact that we can fertilise eggs and gestate viable embryos without the need for men at all (except for banked sperm), that it would mean that there would be no need for men, yet they are still here.

Trans women who want to be pregnant: they’d be better off changing their religion to one that includes reincarnation and hoping for better luck next time.

To be honest I think there's more chance of getting "man gives birth" to work by sorting out how to do head transplants.

@AlfonsoTheTerrible

It would be an implant, not a transplant. A transplant is replacing an existing organ; an implant is inserting a new device.

Getting the language right is crucial.

This is a really important point

I really think we are a long way off before this becomes at all possible.
And then it will be a long time again between it becoming theoretically possible, and becoming a pragmatic possibility.
So I'm not too concerned about this happening any time soon. It will remain science fiction for a while yet!

However, what does concern me is that this nonsense is being peddled to vulnerable young people, who could believe the lie that if they transition they will one day be able to carry their own child.
In reality, it will not become a possibility in their lifetime, but by the time they realise this it may be too late.
Thought experiments are one thing, but pretending that science is going to make this possible in the near future is very irresponsible and cruel imo.

Some years ago, I remember reading about a heterosexual couple where the man wanted a womb implant in order to bear a child. I think the woman struggled with pregnancy, so the man wanted to relieve her of the burden. At the time the medical establishment bluntly told him it wasn't possible and to stop being so silly.

I think we are decades away from a male-bodied person being able to gestate a child. However, were it ever to become commonplace, there are many men who might choose to do this. Gay men. Heterosexual men who wish to share the physical burden of bearing children.

The irony is, mtf transitioners will achieve the ultimate female experience only at the same time as men. Once men and women can bear children, it no longer becomes a uniquely female event.

That's interesting! So would women and feminists actually embrace the idea if it meant that men could relieve women of being the sole child bearer, meaning less disruption to their careers and less compromise of their health?

So would women and feminists actually embrace the idea if it meant that men could relieve women of being the sole child bearer, meaning less disruption to their careers and less compromise of their health?

Not this feminist. Not this woman.

Apart from the number of failed attempts actually being dead babies/embryos, who were created and died as a result of selfish, big sky, experimental science where -as you say Catherine it is more about scientist making a name for themselves than being based in ethics - I would never support just so men would share the burden of pregnancy and the knock on of maternity leave/career breaks.

I'd rather see that sorted for women, along with a ton of other stuff, than see it being sold as progress by including men.

Women and Mothers are being erased and reduced to body parts. In the context of this conversation, you can see why.

No. Isn't working to cure heartbreaking female infertility and recurring miscarriages sexy enough? If they can make a man pregnant they can do that. But I suspect they can't do either.

I completely agree with you OhHolyJesus I wouldn't support it either. But I could see some people attempting to justify it on that basis. Hopefully it will remain in the realm of science fiction.

Relevant and with interesting links

twitter.com/stilltish/status/1409853149066797056?s=21

The science fiction is in Leeds.