Should Children Born from Donor-Assisted Reproduction Have Access to Information about their Genetic Parents?
Donor-assisted insemination is a process that enables a woman to conceive a child through the donated sperm/egg of a male or female. Donor insemination is a technique that has been used around the world for fifty eight years. This technique is often used in situations where a man or woman suffer from infertility and are unable to produce children on their own. Donor-insemination is also used to help gay people or single people have children. In these cases, the child grow up to never know their genetic father/mother. The children born from donor- assisted reproduction only have access to basic, non-identifying information such as: race, height, eye-color, etc. This is not enough information to settle the donor-inseminated (DI) children's desire to know about their parents. I personally think the DI children have a natural right to know where they came from. Many DI children say that knowing about their genetic parent is something that they desire more than anything in the world. These children have a right to know about their genetic background, not only for themselves, but for their children as well.
Sperm donations provides people with a miracle to be able to raise a child that has a connection with them, unlike adopted children. The problem is that once these children grow up and find out the truth about their origin, they develop a curiosity about their genetic parent. It is unfair to tell these children that they will never know half of their history and culture. Many DI children feel as if they have been denied a basic right. Even adopted children have the right to search for their genetic parents. Why can't DI children be entitled to this same privilege? Many problems have occurred from donor anonymity. In one case , a half brother and sister married and later found out they were related. Even though, there are ways to find out if two people are related through medical technology, should DI children have to screen every relationship they get in? There was also a case in California, where twins were born and their uncle turned out to also be their genetic father! When cases like this occur, it can cause incest between half brothers and sisters and genetic disorders will be widely increased.
Couples experiencing infertility issues now have a number of options at their disposal from in-vitro fertilization to intrauterine insemination or going as far as using a surrogate and donor eggs or donor sperm. Technology has made it possible for someone to experience the joy of parenthood regardless of whether they can naturally conceive children. All of these procedures come with their own ethical questions and pros and cons. One of the biggest moral dilemmas is what to do with the left-over embryos still in storage when a family has decided they have had enough children. Most couples see this ethical quandary because they recognize that the embryos are whole human beings and do not think it is morally right to dispose
Assisted Reproductive Technology (ART) is a measure used to treat infertility where both sperm and eggs are handled, In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) the most common form has been used since 1981 in the United States. ART may enable individuals who were previously not able to conceive and deliver a child the ability to do so. In 2009 the Suleman Octuplets were born using the IVF technique to a single mother who also had six other children under the same methods. The Suleman Octuplets and their mother, Nadya Suleman, became a focus of interest for many based on the controversy and ethical dilemmas that surrounded their birth.
The advancement and continued developments of third-party assisted reproductive medical practices has allowed many prospective parents, regardless of their marital status, age, or sexual orientation, to have a new opportunity for genetically or biologically connected children. With these developments come a number of rather complex ethical issues and ongoing discussions regarding assisted reproduction within our society today. These issues include the use of reproductive drugs, gestational services such as surrogacy as well as the rights of those seeking these drugs and services and the responsibilities of the professionals who offer and practice these services.
Is it wrong to make a child deaf by design? How much leeway should parents have in selecting the characteristics of their child (when it comes to aspects of identity)? Should they have any? These are just a couple of difficult questions posed by Sandel. Presenting a similar case, Sandel discusses the case of an infertile couple seeking an egg donor. They sought a very specific type of donor, going as far as requesting an achieved SAT score. In both of these cases, the outcomes are still susceptible to a certain degree natural variation and uncertainty. Does this element of unpredictability add to the moral correctness of these cases?
Although science is at a peak for overwhelming and astonishing outbreaks, the ethical issues concerning these “out breaks” have been inadequately addressed. As the options that couples that are desperate to have a child expand, so do too the expectations of whom the child becomes. Couples are able to choose a donor, of either gender, based on characteristics that they see fit to their liking. Although imperfect, couples now have the ability to choose their child’s gender. “Medicine tends to be patient-driven at the moment.” Said Charles Strom, MD, PhD, director of medical genetics at Illinois Masonic Medical Center in Chicago. “A patient needs something and physicians do all they can to provide that service, and that sometimes makes one shortcut the ethical considerations.” With our vast
...cy “we” give “birth mother” and agencies being exposed because of what we might find in adoptees records is just a way to keep stuff away from the people who rightfully deserve the right to know. (The Baltimore Sun ).
In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) is a complex series of procedures used to help those who want children but struggle with infertility. The process consists of extracting eggs from a woman and collecting a man’s sperm sample then manually combining them in a lab dish. Once the embryo(s) are created they are transferred to a woman’s uterus. IVF is commonly used in woman who cannot conceive on their own due to different reasonings. “These include but are not limited to blocked or damaged fallopian tubes, male factor infertility, woman with ovulation disorders, genetic disorders, woman who have had their fallopian tubes removed and unexplained infertility.” (American Pregnancy)
Many studies have been done pertaining to egg donation and its medical aspect, but very few studies shows the ethical implications of egg donations. Health Laws such as Fertility Clinic Success Rate and Certification Act,1992 regulates the advertisement of success rate of fertility clinic. Only few states have federal laws for informed consent from egg donors (1-3). Informed consent means that donor understands all the minor details surrounding the egg donation procedure, its side-effects- medical, legal, ethical and emotional and gives permission to undergo the procedure without hesitation or coercion.
The article by Christine Overall, "New Reproductive Technology," discusses the issue of abortion and the new technology involved in abortions. The article makes the case that the fetus is not in the ownership of the parents, therefore when an abortion takes place the embryo should be preserved for future use. This embryo could be used at a later time by the parents, or others can adopt it.
At first glance, assisted procreation practices do not necessarily violate a child’s right to identity. The violation lies in the fact that the state is not taking a serious enough stance on regulating the issues that emerge from assisted procreation technologies. The state is voluntarily removing its responsibilities in regulating this field by allowing cases of donor confusion, the implantation of too many embryos and the disorganization of donor files. Instead of imposing criminal sanctions or punishments, the state is too often turning a blind eye. It has been discovered that individuals, created by means of assisted procreation, are faced with legal challenges when obtaining information relating to their origins.
The addition of a child into a family’s home is a happy occasion. Unfortunately, some families are unable to have a child due to unforeseen problems, and they must pursue other means than natural pregnancy. Some couples adopt and other couples follow a different path; they utilize in vitro fertilization or surrogate motherhood. The process is complicated, unreliable, but ultimately can give the parents the gift of a child they otherwise could not have had. At the same time, as the process becomes more and more advanced and scientists are able to predict the outcome of the technique, the choice of what child is born is placed in the hands of the parents. Instead of waiting to see if the child had the mother’s eyes, the father’s hair or Grandma’s heart problem, the parents and doctors can select the best eggs and the best sperm to create the perfect child. Many see the rise of in vitro fertilization as the second coming of the Eugenics movement of the 19th and early 20th century. A process that is able to bring joy to so many parents is also seen as deciding who is able to reproduce and what child is worthy of birthing.
There is very much controversy surrounding the case of the very popular Henrietta Lacks. One of the major implications on the situation that people have a problem with is the lack of consent obtained by Johns Hopkins University and the doctors involved. All though it was not common place as it is in today’s society, many feel that it was not ethical to perform medical procedures without the patient and their family being given all of the knowledge regarding the situation. The tissue sample taken by doctor Howard W. Jones was unbeknown to the family which violates the ethical respect for the person that should be held. A sample of someone’s DNA is not anything that should be taken lightly or regarded as unimportant. It should have been a decision made by Henrietta, and had she of known of the procedure she may have voted against donating to research. This lack of incorporating Henrietta and her family caused there to be a dismal amount of respect for persons shown by the University and all
Whittaker Hughes, Susan. “The only Americans legally prohibited from knowing who their birth parents are: a rejection of privacy rights as a bar to adult adoptees' access to original birth and adoption records.” Cleveland State Law Review. 55.3 (Summer 2007): p429-461. Academic OneFile. Web. 17 Feb. 2012.
One of these moral dilemmas is that genetic engineering changes the traditional dynamic that occurs between the parent and the offspring. This issue arose over the possibility of having a human embryo with three genetic parents which is now possible due to genetic engineering. The procedure in question “involves transplanting the chromosomes from a single-cell embryo or from an unfertilized egg into a donor egg or embryo from which the chromosomes have been removed”(Foht). The procedure itself is very useful for women with mitochondrial disorders but the issue involved with this is that the embryo would technically have three biological parents. There needs to be a real concern about “the way genetic engineering can alter the relationship between the generations from one of parents accepting the novelty and spontaneous uniqueness of their children to one where parents use biotechnology to choose and control the biological nature of their children”(Foht). There is a special relationship between children and their parents that may be disappearing very soon due to these techniques. Children could be born never truly knowing one of their genetic parents. If these procedures continue to prosper people will have to “accept arrangements that split apart the various biological and social aspects of parenthood, and that deliberately create
Can anybody or anything claim to be a god—the supreme entity that governs all moral authority? Since Gregor Mendel first tinkered with plants for genes to the time of great evolutionists like that of Lamarck and Darwin who proposed their individual theories of evolution; there has been much more technological advancement, debate, controversy, and understanding on the “origin” of humans through scientific fields like that of genetics, genetic engineering, etc. There has always been an assumption and belief of a higher power governing the physical world that scientists and metaphysicists cannot answer; however, there has been great insight into how did we come to be? Any practicing religion will tell you, God or gods are the answer to every question. Both sides are quick to defend either their science or their religion from the fundamentalist to the naturalist. In more recent news, in vitro fertilization (the fertilization of an egg cell outside the body) has begun to see an increase in viability as questions about its ethics and morality have become more accepting due to the costs of a procedure being cut down (not covered by the Affordable Care Act), developments in medical and scientific technology through IVF, and subsidiary factors: the advent of “designer babies” and the increasing tolerance of homosexuality—leading to couples to seek out IVF.