Baby born from dead donor womb transplant in UK first

[IwantToRetire]

Commisseration and support for the family of the woman who died, and happy for the new mother.

But feel sort of uneasy about this.

https://news.sky.com/story/simply-a-miracle-baby-boy-born-from-dead-donor-womb-transplant-in-uk-first-13511093

Of course it is! If you are dying from kidney/heart/whatever failure it will save your life. If you get corneas it means you can see again. You get a womb, so you can have a baby. Which is not (despite some people’s thinking) an inalienable right.

But the point being, your views on it don’t prevail? If the donor consented to donate, and the recipient consented to the operation, that’s it.

I think it’s absolutely wonderful. I’ve seen people’s lives be absolutely destroyed by infertility - an aunt of mine took her own life. Huge Catholic family and everyone around her had several kids. She had had a failed adoption after the child became violent due to trauma and left her hospitalised. Infertility and the rate of children in the care system should not be equated into being the same issue. Children in care is a socioeconomic issue and should be addressed as such through more support in deprived communities, outreach programmes, SureStart centres etc. It is nothing to do with infertility.

It will also reduce the demand for surrogacy which is a huge bonus - far less traumatic for the baby.

And infertility isn’t always by unfortunate chance - infertility can also be caused by sexual abuse as a child or as a result of a violent attack. Would you really tell a women who’s womb had irreparable damage due to childhood abuse that you don’t think she should be eligible for a womb transplant because “tough” and “life isn’t fair”?

People get reconstructive surgeries on the NHS all of the time that may not be life-saving - but will improve their quality of life after their face has been disfigured as a result of a dog attack, car accident, burns etc. This is done because the alternative is for the person to suffer a needlessly miserable existence. So the argument that a transplant needs to be “life-saving” doesn’t wash either.

They should have womb transplants be an “opt-in” thing, separate from the normal organ transplant service where it’s an “opt-out”. I would opt-in with no question. My pregnancy is the best thing to have ever happened to me, I’d love to help give that to another woman.

What a silly thing to say. Nine times out of ten when I start a thread on FWR on what I see as a "women's issue" the vast majority of the posts are then about how TW wil or will not reacti!

So it is really significant that this issue, has remained focused on women.

That is the relevant point.

How many young healthy women die in the uk a year? I doubt there’ll be 5000-15000 wombs available for transplant. Like surrogacy demand will outstrip supply and people will be falling over themselves to justify why you can take a poor woman’s womb away from her so a rich woman can have a baby. I also doubt that at 30k a go this charity will be funding all this for the foreseeable future for everyone that wants a womb. No doubt people will expect the tax payer to fund it.

I don’t think anyone has ever said that the supply out strips demand. I think the reason to highlight that number is that this has the potential for so many people to be helped.

I did on page 1 as I assumed as happens with most threads on FWR it would be about TW.

And then someone tried to make out it was out of the ordinary to suggest that this would be part of a thread of FWR!!

But it should give us pause to wonder about what the potential future trajectories of this may be.

When things are possible but in short supply - who tends to benefit? Who tends to suffer?

AS I posted on page 1 of this thread, this is the solution that a well know radical feminist put forward as the solution to women being controlled by the human who has a womb.

And she was a highly regarded activist!

I mean at the moment it’s very much in the research stage.

as research evolves it will become easier, cheaper and faster to do. I would happily sign up to donate my womb. I think a lot of you are panicking for no real reason.

Well neither do they really for a vagina.

I just see it as another objective men would want to have, to be able to (falsely) assert they really are female.

And given that there are some in the medicial profession who would happily, if paid enough try and find a way to achieve this, who knows.

!

I’m much less worried about womb transplants than I am about those sperm donation Facebook groups where men (whether genuine well-meaning or breeding fetishists) can donate their untested semen to women who want to get pregnant, and there’s no limit on how many women they can inseminate. That’s going to blow-up in the next few years and you’ll see clusters of children with genetic health conditions popping up in specific areas, and then later on down the line people will be dating their sibling and not realising. That could genuinely be harmful.

Womb-transplants, in which consent has been gained from the donor before death and the pregnancy is managed by consultants and the process is regulated by health agencies, resulting in a much wanted babies who don’t need to go through the trauma of being ripped away from the mum (like they experience in surrogacy) - really isn’t concerning to me in comparison to what I have mentioned above.

Its well documented that donor recipients can suffer psychological effects following transplants, therefore it’s safe to assume that babies born either through surrogacy or via uterus transplants might experience the same sort of effects as they grow up.
https://www.kidney.org.uk/looking-to-the-future-the-emotional-impact-following-a-kidney-transplant

This is just 8j the UK.

People can perform less ethical surgeries abroad

Womb-transplants I think could be really positive and empowering for women but I deffo see concerns that the TWAW brigade will want to get their hands on wombs which could ruin it for the rest of us.

I’d give consent for my womb to be transplanted after death - but if there was a possibility it could be used on a trans woman, I’d change my mind.

That happens now though.

You can go abroad to get less ethical plastic surgery, dental care, or even organ transplants.

Does that mean we shouldn’t advance medical techniques in this country?

Agree.

It's another way of dehumanising women.

Lots already get pressured/ supported to give up their eggs.

It's just another way of pressurising women to be kind.

The woman who gave up her womb did not consent to this procedure. Her family made that decision for her.

And the doctors just want to be the first so they can have their names in the history books.

Depending on the advances in this field over the next 10 years it'll become a lot clearer what the dangers to women from this procedure are.

I dont think it's safe to say that at all but 🤷🏼‍♀️

It already has in IVF sperm donation 1 man who has a genetic condition that causes cancer has fathered 100s of children all over the UK and EU there were several articles about him just a few months ago. They still haven't changed how sperm banks act or limit how many "donations" a man can make

The women in question did not consent to donating her womb. Her family decided to donate it for her.

The donor would have consented to organ donation.

It’s like saying that a heart donor didn’t consent to their heart being abused. You can’t dictate what happens to the organs once you’ve agreed to donate them. You donate on the understanding that they will use whatever viable organs they can, in whichever way they’re needed.

The women in question were organ donors, or the families decided to pursue organ donation after death.

People are killed foe their kidneys/ lungs and hearts etc.

As the above surgery becomes more mainstream its just another reason for women to get targeted worldwide.

So because you weren’t happy no one else deserves a chance?

That's not true. They only use the organs you've not withdrawn consent for, and (at the moment) only a select few organs are available to consent to.