In 2005, after six heartbreaking years of trying to get pregnant, Gina Rathan and her husband,…

In 2005, after six heartbreaking years of trying to get pregnant,
Gina Rathan and her husband, Cheddi, finally conceived a daughter through IVF.
About a year later, when they conceived a second child naturally, the Rathans
decided their family was complete. But their venture into the world of
reproductive medicine was by no means over. In 2008, they received a bill from
the infertility clinic for $750 for preservation of three frozen embryos left
over from their IVF treatment. What to do? “I don’t see them as not being life
yet,” said Gina Rathan, 42, a pharmaceutical-sales representative. “
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In 2005, after six heartbreaking years of trying to get pregnant,
Gina Rathan and her husband, Cheddi, finally conceived a daughter through IVF.
About a year later, when they conceived a second child naturally, the Rathans
decided their family was complete. But their venture into the world of
reproductive medicine was by no means over. In 2008, they received a bill from
the infertility clinic for $750 for preservation of three frozen embryos left
over from their IVF treatment. What to do? “I don’t see them as not being life
yet,” said Gina Rathan, 42, a pharmaceutical-sales representative. “I thought,
‘How can I discard them when I have a beautiful child from that IVF cycle?’”60
The Rathans aren’t alone in their dilemma. Many other former infertility
patients also must wrestle with the fate of the cryopreserved several hundred
thousand embryos in the United States. Couples with leftover frozen
embryos—about half the people who undergo IVF procedures—have three choices:
discard the embryos, donate them to research, or make them available to another
couple for pregnancy. The default option is

option is to leave the embryos in a vat of minus310-degree
liquid nitrogen, paying for the storage and deferring the decision. Thus, the
Rathans’ bill. Now, however, embryo-protection legislation could winnow the
options of the Rathans and others like them. Several states are considering
proposals that would change the legal status of frozen embryos and possibly
limit future infertility treatments. Georgia and West Virginia, for example,
are considering legislation that would give “personhood” status to frozen
embryos, and New Jersey legislators have moved to allow unused embryos to
become “wards of the state.” A bill in Indiana would make destruction of an
abandoned human embryo a misdemeanor. In November 2008, Colorado voters soundly
defeated an amendment to the state’s constitution that would have effectively
granted frozen embryos rights by defining a person to include “any human being
from the moment of fertilization.” A similar proposal on the federal level, HR
157, the Sanctity of Human Life Act, from Rep. Paul Broun (R-Ga), would define
life as beginning with fertilization and, thus, grant stored embryos “all the
legal and constitutional attributes and privileges of personhood.”

1. In your opinion, what is the icy clump of cells smaller
than a grain of sand stored in a fertility clinic? What does your faith
tradition teach?

2. Would you support the proposed legislation?

3. What would you do with stored embryos were they yours?
Explain by reference to some moral principle(s).

4. According to the American Society for Reproductive
Medicine’s guidelines, a clinic can consider embryos abandoned and dispose of
them if five years have passed without contact with the couple and if
significant efforts have been made to reach the couple. Do you agree with this
guideline?

5. Who do you think should determine the fate of frozen
embryos?

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