In Vitro Fertilization Essay

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One of the most natural and necessary actions in life is that of reproduction. For many families it is not just a natural process, but also a deep desire to have children and raise a family. For those that experience problems with reproduction, because of the development of new medical technologies, there are options like adoption and reproductive assistance. Due to the desire of many to have biological children, these families turn to the option of Assistive Reproductive Technology (ART), including In Vitro Fertilization (IVF), Intrauterine Insemination (IUI), and Third Part Assisted ART (sperm donation, egg donation, or surrogacy) (Assisted). After much consideration and research, it is clear that stances on In Vitro Fertilization are …show more content…

For those that believe life and moral significance begins at conception, In Vitro Fertilization is dealing with living children. For those that do not believe life, or moral significance, begins at conception, In Vitro Fertilization is just dealing with the potential for children and is then approached differently. In addition to the issue of life in the womb, it is important to look at the specifics of what occurs during the procedure to ultimately know where one stands on the issue. During In Vitro Fertilization, after taking eggs and sperm from the couple, they are incubated together in a laboratory and fertilized in a dish to create an embryo. The embryo is then placed into the woman’s uterus, where there is a chance of it implanting and resulting in a successful pregnancy. There are several steps taken during In Vitro Fertilization. The first step is the stimulation of egg maturation, during which a woman takes medication to stimulate the ovaries in order to prepare and release many eggs at one time (Assisted). When the eggs are mature, determined by the size of the ovarian follicle and the level of estrogen, there is a specific medicine injected to initiate the ovulation process, and a health care provider retrieves the eggs 34 to 36 hours after the injection (Assisted). Egg retrieval is the …show more content…

When considering how In Vitro Fertilization lines up with the natural order of things, there are multiple similarities. With human reproduction, the uniting of a sperm and egg within a female’s body begins the process for a new individual. During the process of IVF, the uniting of the sperm and egg just takes place outside of the body, monitored by medical professionals. For those that do not believe life and moral importance begin at conception, there is an attitude that it is “‘absolutely fine to discard embryos’ because they have no central nervous system, feeling of pain, consciousness, concept of their own identity, or any interest in their own future existence” (Ehrich). This view of the embryo really simplifies the issues dealt with during In Vitro Fertilization because it takes away any responsibility to the embryo as a valuable life and turns it into a work object (Ehrich). Some also do not view embryos that are frozen or existing in a Petri dish as “potential life” because the embryos are not in an environment where they are going to grow and develop into a pregnancy (Ehrich). In this case, it would be wrong to abort the unwanted children after implantation but not before, while they are in

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