Frozen Embryo and the "Right To life"

[OneHumpNotTwo]

I believe that very soon a case is coming before the High Court alleging that a frozen embryo has a right to life . I do not know the facts of the case but I understand that the Applicant is relying on Article 40.3(3) of the Constitution

The State acknowledges the right to life of the unborn and, with due regard to the equal right to life of the mother, guarantees in its laws to respect, and, as far as practicable, by its laws to defend and vindicate that right.

The Applicant is relying on the Right to Life of the "unborn" .

Question: Define “Unborn”

Answer:

(a) an “unborn” comes into existence once the egg is fertilized (even in a Petrie dish)

or

(b) an “unborn” does not come into existence until the embryo is implanted in the womb(or later)


If the answer is (a) then every embryo has the right to life and must be implanted in a womb and given the chance to grow and be born.

In the in vitro process it is normal that multiple eggs are fertilized and then one chosen for implantation. If the first does not take then a second is used and so on.

If the answer is (a) the natural mother must have twins or triplets or… octuplets, or she must have a series of pregnancies. If she becomes too ill, too old etc then a surrogate mother must be found to bring the embryo to maturity. Consideration would also have to be given to the “shelf life ” of an embryo.

If the answer is (b) another set of problems arise. There is no Constitutional protection and there are no rules. Dr Frankenstein and all his insane little minions can play havoc with the human DNA without restriction. There is no legislation in Ireland regulating the matter.



It would be nice if we could have a rational discussion about the subject.


Most of the links below are pro life . I wanted to give a balanced set but I did not keep a record of some of the sites I have looked at. I especially wanted to give a link to the opinion of the medical/obstetric viewpoint. The medics don’t know when life begins(you will have to find that link yourself ).

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/4655035.stm

http://www.cwnews.com/news/viewstory.cfm?recnum=6982


http://www.bioethics.ie/pdfs/129171-Bio ... search.pdf


http://www.irishhealth.com/index.html?level=4&id=4611


http://www.irishmedicalnews.ie/articles ... leID=16461

[Worldbystorm]

(a) an “unborn” comes into existence once the egg is fertilized (even in a Petrie dish)

or

(b) an “unborn” does not come into existence until the embryo is implanted in the womb(or later)


If the answer is (a) then every embryo has the right to life and must be implanted in a womb and given the chance to grow and be born.

In the in vitro process it is normal that multiple eggs are fertilized and then one chosen for implantation. If the first does not take then a second is used and so on.

If the answer is (a) the natural mother must have twins or triplets or… octuplets, or she must have a series of pregnancies. If she becomes too ill, too old etc then a surrogate mother must be found to bring the embryo to maturity. Consideration would also have to be given to the “shelf life ” of an embryo.

If the answer is (b) another set of problems arise. There is no Constitutional protection and there are no rules. Dr Frankenstein and all his insane little minions can play havoc with the human DNA without restriction. There is no legislation in Ireland regulating the matter.

Two or three points.

Firstly, even a nodding acquaintance with the centres which conduct IVF in this country would demonstrate that for the most part they are very conservative in the treatments that they do and the idea that they're gung ho to experiment on embryo's is wrong. Indeed my understanding is that they generally take guidelines from the UK HFEA on this matter in the absence of indigenous guidelines.

Secondly, you may not be aware but there has been an all-party committee working on a report, which you can download on this very area. The IT reported yesterday that this issue was one of the reasons the report wasn't forwarded to legislation, but it's remarkable how consistently uniform and consensus driven the outcomes were, actually pretty liberal all told.

Thirdly in IVF it tends to be that two fertilised eggs are implanted. For many women even getting one fertilised egg is a huge achievement and so the issue does not arise. Surplus eggs are frozen and kept in storage for, I think five years, or so.

Finally even if one were to accept your contentions as absolutes (life/non-life) that does not necessarily mean that the scenarios you propose would follow through. For example, I'm not sure that a lack of Constitutional protection per se would preclude a legal framework which would prevent experimentation on human DNA.

Another couple of thoughts. It is an accepted medical fact that fertilised eggs, or embryos develop naturally and equally naturally are discarded by the body on a regular basis prior to implantation. Now, I don't claim to know the mind of God, but this seems to me to point us to a situation where at that particular stage of development absolute definitions of life, or rather how we address the situation, are less clear cut than might be thought.

[OneHumpNotTwo]

Everything I have heard about the centres which conduct IVF in this country confirms that they conform to he highest ethical standards, and if I appear to have suggested otherwise I apologise to those professionals working in that area.

The purpose of my post was ,among other reasons, to point out that there are no laws governing IVF, stem cell research etc in this country . This is a thorny subject that our government will have to face in the very near future. Whatever decision is made by the government will be opposed by some faction or other.

[stringjack]

Another couple of thoughts. It is an accepted medical fact that fertilised eggs, or embryos develop naturally and equally naturally are discarded by the body on a regular basis prior to implantation. Now, I don't claim to know the mind of God, but this seems to me to point us to a situation where at that particular stage of development absolute definitions of life, or rather how we address the situation, are less clear cut than might be thought.

Lots of people are killed by earthquakes. What do you suppose we should infer about the mind of God from this fact?

[FutureTaoiseach]

I am unsure about this issue. On the one hand I do not consider a frozen embryo to constitute human-life as we know it (as Spock might have put it). I also feel that ideally adult-stem cells should - where possible - be researched on instead. One fear I have about researching frozen embroys is that they could lead to genetic-engineering of a social kind rather than health-care based, and I would be uncomfortable with this. However, if it were established that adult-stem cells simply weren't up to the job of curing certain diseases like AIDS etc. then I would approve of stem-cell research solely for health-care purposes.

[smiffy]

I also feel that ideally adult-stem cells should - where possible - be researched on instead. One fear I have about researching frozen embroys is that they could lead to genetic-engineering of a social kind rather than health-care based, and I would be uncomfortable with this.

Why are you afraid of this in the context of embryonic stem-cell research, but not (apparently) research on adult stem-cells or indeed research into genetic engineering (which, as far as I'm aware, isn't that linked to stem-cells in the first place - although I may well be wrong on that).

[Worldbystorm]

Another couple of thoughts. It is an accepted medical fact that fertilised eggs, or embryos develop naturally and equally naturally are discarded by the body on a regular basis prior to implantation. Now, I don't claim to know the mind of God, but this seems to me to point us to a situation where at that particular stage of development absolute definitions of life, or rather how we address the situation, are less clear cut than might be thought.

Lots of people are killed by earthquakes. What do you suppose we should infer about the mind of God from this fact?

Nothing, I was being purely rhetorical. I'm an agnostic by the way. With a certain sympathy for theism, but agnostic nonetheless...

[stringjack]

Nothing, I was being purely rhetorical.

Well, indeed - so was I.

[FutureTaoiseach]

I also feel that ideally adult-stem cells should - where possible - be researched on instead. One fear I have about researching frozen embroys is that they could lead to genetic-engineering of a social kind rather than health-care based, and I would be uncomfortable with this.

Why are you afraid of this in the context of embryonic stem-cell research, but not (apparently) research on adult stem-cells or indeed research into genetic engineering (which, as far as I'm aware, isn't that linked to stem-cells in the first place - although I may well be wrong on that).

Oops. Should have made myself clearer. I oppose genetic-engineering for solely social-purposes regardless of whether it entails research on adult or embyonic stem-cells.

[Worldbystorm]

Nothing, I was being purely rhetorical.

Well, indeed - so was I.

Good stuff...