Potatoes. :D

Ethical issues
Is the right of being a parent more important or the welfare of children more important? Should the gay/lesbian parents have a baby through IVF just for the sake of having a child of their own, or consider how would the child develop in the emotionally, without a father and having two same-sexed adults as parents. This debate over IVF tends to concentrate on the adults, with sympathy towards those who are trying to have children, many of the resulting children, however, suffer from emotional problems. Although preventing single woman and lesbian from having access to IVF treatment can be seen as an intrusion of theirs right but the main issue here is the child's rights and welfare. Has anybody thought out the implications of a child going to school who has two lesbians for parents? Children of same-sex couples will be exposed to a great deal of ridicule and hatred by their fellow peers. This could negatively affect their development. The children could also undergo unbearable bullying and low self-esteem, serious mental problems and ultimately even suicide. The children through IVF of two same-sexed parents will grow up to wonder why they are different from the other people who have a male and a female as parents. This ridicule and sense of difference would possibly follow them for life and they can never live a normal life. The children will also be emotionally confused by the values of their same-sexed parents and the values of a normal society in which only people of opposite sexes are supposed to be together, hence their mindset will be affected. Before lesbian/gay couples try to have children together just so to be a parent, they should consider if they will be able to give their children a normal life and their welfare as that of children of opposite-sexed parents. The long range effects on children who are brought up by two women or two men are unknown and can only be speculated upon. Also, children raised in families led by same-sex parents would be continually exposed to homosexuality. They may choose to become gay or lesbian at a higher rate than those raised by a father and mother.

Should the role of a father in a child’s life be undermined? A child deserves to have a father and mother. Families are struggling to stay together, as it is in our society, it would be putting that child at a disadvantage to start life without one. A father role is very much important as a mother's in a child's life. A mother does best at being a mother and a father does best at being a father. One can not in anyway fully compensate for the other, you can not say that having just one is better than both, You want the child to grow up having the maximum opportunity and the best way for this is having a mother and a father. Both father and mother contribute different and essential things to the child as it grows up and the child can then experience. Even from birth, children who have an involved father are more likely to be emotionally secure, be confident to explore their surroundings, and, as they grow older, have better social connections with peers. These children also are less likely to get in trouble at home, school, or in the neighborhood. Infants who receive high levels of affection from their fathers are more securely attached; that is, they can explore their environment comfortably when a parent is nearby and can readily accept comfort from their parent after a brief separation. A number of studies suggest they also are more sociable and popular with other children throughout early childhood. The way fathers play with their children also has an important impact on a child's emotional and social development. Generally speaking, fathers also tend to promote independence and an orientation to the outside world. Fathers often push achievement while mothers stress nurturing, both of which are important to healthy development. As a result, children who grow up with involved fathers are more comfortable exploring the world around them and more likely to exhibit self-control and pro-social behavior. One study of school-aged children found that children with good relationships with their fathers were less likely to experience depression, to exhibit disruptive behavior, or to lie and were more likely to exhibit pro-social behavior. This same study found that boys with involved fathers had fewer school behavior problems and that girls had stronger self-esteem. In short, fathers have a powerful and positive impact upon the development and health of children who make important contributions to their children's development and are valuable allies in the mission to create a permanent and safe environment for children. By allowing IVF treatments to single women and removing the requirement of ‘the need of that child for a father’, it would seem to be saying the role of father’s in a child life is not important hence it could be ignore. However this is not what our group feels as both parents are equally important and vital in providing a healthy lifestyle for children. Men and women have very different personalities, brain structure, talents, etc. They are designed to fit into very different roles within the family. In order for children to be properly socialized, they need to be brought up by both a father and a mother.

This problem also further leads to the questioning of another issue of whether the children ought to have the right to know as a result of IVF. Christmas is a time normally spent with the family, but an increasing number of children are wondering who their father may be. Some countries allow men to be anonymous sperm donors for in-vitro fertilization (IVF) programs, thus depriving the resulting children from even knowing who their father is. Not knowing one's father stirs up enough problems. Most of the children who are searching for their fathers at least grew up in a family with a father present, even if he was not their biological parent. The child's right to information about her genetic origins should, it was argued that priority is over the donor's right to privacy. The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child contains a right to know one's identity, as far as possible; and it has recently been accepted that a person's interest in information about their genetic father might be protected under Article 8 of the Human Rights Act 1998 (the right to private and family life). And rights unquestionably give the impression of a strong and uncompromising committment to protecting the interests of vulnerable groups. More importantly still, mothers are under no obligation to name the child's father on the birth certificate: mothers' interests in keeping the father's identity secret are allowed to trump children's interests in knowing the truth. This in turn leads to an interesting difference from adoption. Adopted children have the right to see their original birth certificate when they reach the age of 18. This will tell them the identity of their mother, but it might or might not reveal their father's identity. To a number of people, a child should have a right to know who his or her father is. That's the basis on which adopted children now have rights to access their adoption records. There is a real debate to be had on the identity confusion that can result when a child has no way of finding out who his or her father is. It is also difficult to see how any right to information about one's origins might be enforced. Although there is clearly a connection between anonymity and secrecy, it is very important to remember that they are not the same thing. The right to information about the gamete donor will not necessarily eliminate secrecy surrounding the circumstances of a child's conception. Unless the use of donated gametes must be recorded on the child's birth certificate, or a duty is imposed upon parents to tell their child that they were conceived using donated gametes, the right to information will not automatically lead to greater openness. An eloquent example of the anguish this causes was the case of Katrina Clark. The Washington Post on Dec. 17 told the story of the undergraduate student at Gallaudet University, who described how at 18 years of age, "I haven't known half my origins." Clark was conceived by means of an unknown sperm donor, when her mother was 32 and afraid she might otherwise not have a family. She mentioned that not knowing one’s own father might lead to having emotional problems. It would, perhaps, be more helpful to regard the removal of anonymity as a way of protecting a child's interest in (and not her right to) greater openness and transparency about the circumstances of her conception. If donors are identifiable, a clearer message can be sent to parents that children conceived using donated gametes will generally benefit from frank and honest disclosure as early as possible in childhood.

Vincent

6. Final solution and reasoning.

The final solution and reasoning, that we propose, will be to implement laws to prevent lesbian/gay couples from using IVF to have children. At first sight, it may seem that we are removing the freedom from these couples. However, our solution is not made without reason.

In the first place, as raised by the ethical questions above, we humans should not be trying to play God, by using IVF to create babies. If nature does not call for a couple to be both of the same sex, then why try to go against nature? It is simply not natural in the first place and this will cause many discomfort and harm to the society and the parties involved. IVF, should only be used, as a last resort, for couples who cannot conceived naturally. These couples are given this right because by normal circumstances, they should be able to conceive and have a child. They have the ability to do so in the first place. However their situation maybe a case that they are not able to conceive, and need some scientific help. IVF should not however be abused in the case of trying to create babies when the couple is and should not be able to conceive and have a baby in the first place.

As mentioned above, the harm brought to the society and the parties involved is not small, especially for the child involved. To start with, the sexual orientation of the child may be confused because without a father by the side and instead, a woman taking over the place of the father, the child is not able to experience a ‘real’ fatherly love and no matter how the ‘father’ in this case tries to substitute himself as a father, she cannot provide the child with the needs a child tends to want from a father. The child will not be able to experience a real father’s care and also get mixed up upon real parenting roles.

A father plays this special role in it that he serves, as normally the role model, the tall and big figure that the child looks up to and aspires to grow up to be. He is normally the supporting figure and anchor of the family, whereas the mother plays the other role, a role that takes care of the child and remains very close to the child while the father will seem a little more distant from the child due to work. Without a fatherly figure in the child’s life, it can be said that he/she will lose out because there is no physical support for the child in his/her years of growing up and no inspirational figure to look towards to.

Further more, looking at the parents of his classmates may serve to confuse him further because he will be wondering upon why, his classmates have a male as a father and not 2 females instead as parents.

By bringing the child into this world, it is natural that the child will be outcast. He/she may already suffer from having ‘weird parents’ and added to the possibility of the confusion of his sexual orientation, it will be to no surprise that the child will find it hard to mix around with fellow peers and be accepted by them. This is then very unfair upon the child.

Also, by using this solution, we will be addressing the problem of using someone’s sperm as your own in order to create another child. It is also wrong to create a child with someone’s sperm. If used as a last resort case by a normal couple who cannot have kids, then it should be okay. However, if a lesbian couple used such techniques to create another life, then it wills a form of abuse of the sperm donated. The main purpose of one donating their sperm is to allow other men, who have certain problems with their reproductive organs, to use them and create a new life with his wife and enjoy the fun of having a child. Therefore, by using someone’s sperm to create a child for a lesbian couple, it may cause the public to be upset about this as people misused the sperm bank for their own gains. Hence, it is essential to prevent such situations from happening.

Lastly, by adopting this solution, we can prevent the dilution of family bonding. Family is a basic unit of society and its importance must not be underestimated. Family helps to shapes one character form young and teaches him basic ideals such as love and care. Hence, it is important to have a complete family so as to prevent society from collapsing. From statistics, we can observe that the amount of families with a single parent is steadily increasing over the past decade. This will weaken bonds both in the family and between families. Therefore, by preventing gay and lesbian couples from having fatherless/motherless babies, we can reduce the amount of single parent family in a country. This will ensure that the children have a healthy growing environment and do not have to endure discrimination from the public. Thus, from this solution, we can reduce the number of single parent child and promotes family bonds.

In conclusion, we decided to implement laws to prevent lesbian/gay couples from using IVF to have children as our final solution. By implementing laws, we can prevent the abuse of IVF by lesbian and gay couples. Secondly, we can prevent the mixing up of sexual orientation in child from birth. Thirdly, we can also stop the abuse of donated sperm present in the sperm bank to conceive children as sperm stored in the bank should be used for normal couples the experience the joy of having a child. Lastly, we can prevent the weakening and dilution of family bonds and therefore prevent the collapse of society. Hence, we decided to implement laws prevent lesbian/gay couples from using IVF to have children so as to help the society, which consists the majority, instead of the gay and lesbian couples, which consists the minority , to abuse IVF for their gains.

Nicholas and Jia Hui

5. What are some possible solutions and their consequences?

In my opinion, these are the possible solutions to our case study regarding fatherless children. Firstly, the government can consider implementing laws to prevent cases such as a fatherless child from happening. A growing kid needs both the mother and father to support him and educate while he matures and become an adult. Without the father or mother, he will feel a sense of lost due to lack of the other parent in his life and may be mocked my other children in schools and communities. This will harm his mental growth and may be difficult to gain acceptance by society when he grows up. It brings more harms than benefits to the children itself and therefore I proposed that the government should implements laws to prevent such actions from taking place. However, one consequence that may arise is there may be protests from people that support gay and lesbian communities and also people who support the equality of human rights. This may cause disruption in one’s country.

The second solution I propose is to educate the gay and lesbian couples about the problems that may arise if they continue to pursue a single parent child. By educating them, the couples will have more knowledge about the harms that will be brought by having a single parent child. Such education can be carried out as public lectures or workshops. This will lead them to think more carefully and in the end make an informed decision instead of deciding it hastily without giving much thought to it. In turn, this will lower down the cases of fatherless/motherless babies. However, one consequence is not all gay and lesbian couples do not receive such public education as they may not hear of it or miss the timing. Therefore, it may be ineffective and the cases of a single parent child may rise.

Another solution that our group proposes is to conduct a survey and see what is the public’s opinion regarding such actions. By consulting opinion from the public, we can then know the public’s consensus about this issue and therefore tune our other solutions in order to make it effective. Also, by conducting a survey, it will heighten the awareness within the public, which includes the gay and lesbian couples. Therefore, we can also seek their opinion about this matter and make a more informed decision with regards to our final proposed solution. However, our main concern regarding this solution is that not all members of the public will take part in this survey due to the sensitive topics that the survey deals with. Therefore, our survey results may be inaccurate and hence will adversely affect our decision and understanding of the general consensus in the public regarding fatherless/motherless babies.

As we need to consider both sides of this issue, our final proposed solution is to give education to those couples who insist on a fatherless/motherless child. Such education will mainly focus on the child’s psychology and mental health and how to properly take care of their child in a single parent family. These measures will help to lessen the negatives of a single parent child and helps the child to cope with the fact that both of his/her parents are of a single sex. However, one of the consequences of such action is the there may be a rise in the amount of cases of fatherless/motherless children. This will affect the growth of the younger population in a country, which are hailed to be as future leaders. Therefore, there should be a limit or a quota of how many fatherless/motherless children a country should have.

Jia Hui

4. What values that play a role in this decision?

I am going to focus important values that should follow the use of IVF by lesbian couples and also on the children and the effects upon them, if they have parents that are of the same sex.

To start with, the sexual orientation of the child may be confused because without a father by the side and instead, a woman taking over the place of the father, the child is not able to experience a ‘real’ fatherly love and no matter how the ‘father’ in this case tries to substitute himself as a father, she cannot provide the child with the needs a child tends to want from a father. The child will not be able to experience a real father’s care and also get mixed up upon real parenting roles.

It is also wrong actually, to want to have a child, using someone else’s sperm. If used as a last resort case by a normal couple who cannot have kids, then it should be okay. But however, a lesbian couple doing this because they do not have sperms between them is just wrong. The lesbian couple is not supposed to have children in the first place. It is wrong to bring the child into this world using such unfair means and the child certainly does not deserve the humiliation he/she may suffer in the future due to having 2 females as his parents.

By bringing the child into this world, it is natural that the child will be outcast. He/she may already suffer from having ‘weird parents’ and added to the possibility of the confusion of his sexual orientation, it will be to no surprise that the child will find it hard to mix around with fellow peers and be accepted by them. This is then very unfair upon the child.

The next value that I am going to touch upon is that it is only natural in life, for a couple of a man and a woman to be together. They can thus have children together and are not going against the laws of nature. Furthermore, the child that they can conceive naturally is able to gain a natural environment in which he can benefit and learn from both parents. It is however, unnatural, for two people of the same gender to be together, because they cannot have children the normal way, having to rely on methods like IVF or adoption.

Nicholas

3. Who are the stakeholders in this situation?

The fatherless IVF babies - A child needs to be brought up by a mother and father for the fundamental reason that the child’s identity was created by a man and a woman, and is only safely nurtured in a household that embodies that fact. Moreover, research two decades ago showed that children were no less than 20 to 33 times safer when they lived with their biological parents rather than in any other type of household, official statistics no longer record marital status, so it has now become impossible to find out about the relative risks of biological and non-biological parents.

The whole idea of gay parents seeking IVF treatment has a detrimental effect on the upbringing of fatherless IVF babies, or babies with parents of the same gender. Most importantly, the IVF babies, when they grew to a age where they will seek to understand themselves, will languish at the fact that they are different from their contemporaries. They are born out of a test tube, they are artificially conceived, they are not natural. Coupled with their questionable genders of their parents, it will cause numerous psychological harms on many levels, through their schooling years, adolescence period and their career. There will always be a form of stigma that they will face in this superficial society when they look for a mate or a job. This sense of shame or social anomaly placed on by their parents will burden them through the rest of their life.

Parents - Lesbians and gays having IVF babies, where babies are in families with parents of the same sex, this whole new notion of family organization will not just harm individuals but will help destroy our understanding of human identity.Through the IVF treatment, the lesbian couples would be regarded as the joint legal parents of children conceived through the use of donated sperm, eggs or embryos, with one woman registered as the mother and the other as the second parent.

But this would be a lie. From the biological point of view, the second parent is the man who donates the sperm. However, the idealist point of view, it states that the second parent is the mother's lesbian partner. So this new idea of thinking will redefine a parent as merely a carer, and thus break the link between biology and parenthood altogether. This will give rise to all sorts of ethical questions, what would happen to the man who provided the sperms? What would the two women feel about claiming other's as their own? Would that prick their conscience and sense of guilt?

Government - This proposed law would actually prevent certain children from having a legal father. Far from addressing the plight of fatherlessness, the Government will now make it impossible for some children to have a father at all.

This also contends with a more serious problem on a national level - the diminishing of the traditional family from the society. The words husband and wife have been steadily removed from official forms and replaced by the word ‘partner’. The whole idea of the need for reproduction and the structure of family will have to be revamped, which saps energy and manpower from the exhausted national resource.

Vincent and Alex

2. What are some ethical questions raised by this situation?

Few ethical questions

Debates on IVF are affected by different views of ethics and countless discrimination. Physicians, scientists, lawyers, and the general public are facing new problems that involve controversies among time proven values.

The result of IVF is rewarding yet harmful. If we look at this issue in a more in depth way, there will be many questions like:

Human life in embryos

In IVF treatment, countless embryos are used to increase fertility rates, however there is one unspoken problem that has never been mentioned, what happens to all those extra embryos?

Often surplus embryos are involved in process of IVF to enhance the chance of pregnancy. Whether they are laboratory tools or not this remains a controversy. But the main question is where does life begin? If human life begins begins at fertilization, would leaving those extra embryos to risky devices like scientific experimentation or embryo-freezing process are counted as a form of murder? This puts a question mark on our conscience.

Report suggests that out of 150 attempts to implant human embryos only 4 actually were successful and only 1 was implanted successful. Knowingly, wasting human beings is unethical. On the other hand, if there is evidence that human life does not begin until after implantation, then IVF would not be unethical from the point of view of that only animal life would be present. Therefore this brings us to our question: Is the zygote human life with potential or potential human life?

“Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception. From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person.”

When this fundamental idea is violated, human life become a mere commodity and easily used for utilitarian purposes. Human life is precious in every stages of life, but this respect for human life is slowly eroded from our selfish society.

Chromosomal and congenital defects

Pregnancy is something of a Russian roulette for all couples. There will always be one defective, one abnormality that sprouts out of nowhere and grows on you. Trying to manipulate Nature always brings negative aftereffects into our lives.This is especially true in IVF. This is the reality that must be conveyed at counseling to all couples contemplating treatment. From the beginnings of IVF treatment there always has been concern to monitor the safety of the IVF patients. It is well established that infants conceived following IVF are more likely to be born prematurely, of low birth weight and to be a twin than naturally conceived infants.

A certain research has found in IVF babies that only 3 out of 14 had a normal chromosomal complement. Congenital malformations include increased neural tube and cardiac defects.

In such unfortunate cases, should the parents be able to sue? In fact it is not easy to prove whether the fault lies in negligence during implantation procedures, moreover, preimplantation diagnosis of genetic diseases may help to lower down the risk.

Turning children into commodities and weakened family bond

For parents who had conceived children artificially and not naturally, this may cause them to think that the child is a possession instead of a gift. In vitro fertilization turns children into commodities. They might think that since they obstructed the way of God to utilise artificial ways for a child, they will undermine the value of natural reproduction, as such the bond with the child is weakened.

Mental bonding arises from intimate physical and emotional contact between parents and children. A mother feels more bond to her baby who has been in her womb for 8 months compared to a woman who obtained her child through an artificial incubator. Which of these will shower more care towards her child? Definitely the former.

The IVF treatment results in a hazy concept of parenthood, blurring the line between natural and artificial. Will IVF children be looked upon as possessions rather than persons with their own rights and destinies? Will our love for the child remain constant regardless of the way we conceive?

Religion: Objection to playing God

Technologies of assisted reproduction such as IVF have been controversial on religious grounds since their initiation, but nonetheless, within Islam, Judaism, Confucianism, Hinduism, and most forms of Christianity, adjustments have been made to facilitate the fertility of their followers.

Catholicism remains the only major world religion that clearly condemns the use of IVF. The Vatican points out that the research and development relating to IVF will inevitably lead to embryo destruction, ultimately the destruction of human life. Moreover, by engaging in IVF, human are essentially obstructing Nature's flow and violating the rules set by God.

To the Catholic church, assisted reproduction is not allowed, because procreation without the coming together of opposite sexes is considered unnatural. The church has been vocal about this issue and claimed that assisted reproduction marred the concept of conjugal unions. Is IVF treatment tantamount to playing god?

Children on hold: The case of frozen surplus embryos

One of the by-products of the typical IVF treatment is the creation of surplus embryos. More embryos are brought into existence than can be used in implantation. The remaining embryos are frozen to be used later if the first attempt proves unsuccessful or when the couple wants another child.

However, not all parents indicate what should be done with them. The accumulation of frozen embryos has resulted in impressive numbers of embryos stocked in the freezers of the large fertility clinics. The startling growth of their number urges on the ethical debate on the fate of these embryos.

In 1996, a British organization known as the Human Fertilization and Embryology Authority estimated that a total of 52,000 frozen embryos existed in the United Kingdom. In 2000 there were a total of 71,176 frozen embryos in Australia and New Zealand. Other than scientific research, what will we do with all those embryos? Will the extended period of time of freezing cause problems in frozen embyro transfer or fetal abnormalities? Or are we going to let those embryos slowly getting wasted under the name of science?

Alex and Vincent

1. What are the relevant facts of this case?

What is IVF?
In vitro literally means ‘in glass’. The dictionary explains it as a process made to occur outside the biological body, in an artificial environment. Thus, in vitro fertilisation simply means the fertilisation process that occurs under lab conditions and not inside the mother’s womb.
Under natural conditions, for pregnancy to take place, the sperm from the male body unites with the egg inside the fallopian tube of the female body. However, a number of factors can contribute to this process not occurring naturally, including:

Having damaged fallopian tubes
Age
Having had your fallopian tubes removed
Male infertility issues
Hostile cervical mucus

When a couple decides upon IVF, the woman will receive multiple injections of fertility drugs before having her eggs retrieved. Once collected, the eggs are combined with sperm, left to culture and then transferred back to woman’s womb for implantation.

Success Rates

There has long been a debate regarding the success rates of in vitro fertilisation. While some find it the best possible infertility treatment, many are doubtful about its success rates and the complications following the failure.

In reality, there are a number of factors that have to be taken into consideration to analyse the success or the failure of any IVF treatment. Possible reasons why a particular cycle treatment may fail include:

Patient’s age
Sperm and egg quality
Failure to collect eggs
Failure of implantation of the embryos

On an average, there is a 20% to 30% success rate associated with IVF.

In general women above 40 find it a little more difficult to conceive using IVF as the ovulation rate as well as quality of eggs decreases with age. Those who have had a normal delivery before or successful IVF births earlier have a greater chance of getting pregnant the second time over.

The IVF centre where the treatment is done also influences the success rate. Factors like size of the clinic, technical expertise of the team, type of equipments used, protocols for ovary stimulation, and transferring of embryos play an important role in inferring the overall success rate.

Taken from: http://www.womens-health.co.uk/ivf.html

Alex