• Question: What is your view on IVF; is it ethically sound or not to you?

    Asked by jorgaliee to Vicki, Nuruz, Jo, Jane, Greg, Claire on 17 Jun 2010 in Categories: . This question was also asked by moorsey, yasmin123, xfinestx, obviious.
    • Photo: Vicki Onions

      Vicki Onions answered on 17 Jun 2010:

      Hi Jorgaliee
      Thats a good question! Ethics is always tricky one to answer as it will always be a personal view. So, personally speaking, i think IVF is a great development in reproductive science. There are so many couples who desperately want children who, for no fault of their own, can’t have children and would make fantastic parents. For some people, not being able to have children becomes a huge psychological (oh that spelling looks wrong…) issue and really affects their life very badly. So for them, i think IVF is ethically sound.
      Looking at it the other way, and something for you to think about, what about if we developed the technique of doing IVF but then didn’t offer it, would that be ethical?
      Having said that, what i do have ethical reservations about, is the use of IVF for couples who are infertile becasue they are above the natural reoproductive age – have you seen anything in the newspapers about this – women who have had IVF (usually abroad) when they are in their 60’s or even 70’s. Personally, i have a problem with this as my view is that nature created the “menopause” or the end of reproductive life for a reason and that was so that the woman would be most able to rear those children to maturity. However, other people have different views on this (in fact me and my sister argue about this all the time!!!)

    • Photo: Greg FitzHarris

      Greg FitzHarris answered on 17 Jun 2010:

      in the braod sense — yes i do think its ethical. I see infertility as a real ‘disease’ or ‘disorder’ — couples who cant have kids often become seriously unhappy and it can affect their lives greatly. So i think it deserves to be treated, and so i aggree with ivf in principle.

      The hard part is, once you get past that step, there are many issues which people wonder about and disagree about. Just as a cpouple of examples

      1. The question of whether the NHS should fund ivf, and for whom… should rich people (who can afford private treatment) be able to have kids more easily
      2. What to do with unused embryos (usually 8-30 cells in size or so) once the couple get pregnant and dont need them any more… do we just ‘destroy’ them?
      3. How do we know that ivf doesnt have more far reaching effects upon the health of the kids born (remember, the oldet ivf baby is only 31 years old — so its difficult to know whether being an ivf baby will affect, for example, adul-related diseases). I find this one quite tricky, cos conceptually the parents are making a decision (to have IVF) which might (maybe, who kniows) have negative effect upon someone elses health (the baby)

      What do you think jorga?

      anyway — yes, i think ivf is ethically sound i general…. but there are lots of little dabates within it

      cheers
      g

    • Photo: Claire O'Donnell

      Claire O'Donnell answered on 17 Jun 2010:

      These are my own personal views OK? … and it goes on a bit but i think it’s worthe thinking about.
      I think that IVF is fine and a good thing. It’s important to be able to treat peopel whose bodies aren’t working as they should. I think that sometimes the NHS makes decisions that I’m less comfortable with. Let me explain. After the eggs are fertilised if the couple are lucky they they have a number of embryos. New guidance means that the embryos should be replaced one at a time to reduce the chance of having twins which is bad for the babies ( twins tend to be smaller when they’re born and being small then can cause problems) and bad for the mother. The other embryos can be frozen. All fine so far. However in some parts of the country the NHS will only fund one treatment and so if the first embryo doesn’t result in a pregnancy that’s it. Happily most parts of the NHS are moving away from this and will replace embryos that have been frozen. Even so if the embryo goes on to develop and a baby is born, most areas won;t fund the couple to have any more of their embryos replaced to have any more children. That’s not the case in the area I did the work ( they’ll put all tehy embryos back but no new treatment) but it is in most others. You have to remember that the NHS has to share the money around as best it can so you can’t fund IVF endlessly but I think that I would prefer to see treatment offered to fewer people but to let them use all their embryos rather than give more people a chance but potentially leave them with failed treatment and embryos they can’t use. People can pay to have the embryos replaced but I imagine that there will always be people who can’t afford it and that must be really hard.
      Then there’s the question of the embryos that are left over after people have used the ones they needed. I think I’d be more comfortable with those embryos being offered to people who can’t produce an embryo of their own, perhaps the women that Vicki is trying to help with damaged ovaries or people whose eggs are ‘dodgey ‘ as Greg says! They’re just my views, other people feel very differently. I think the good thing about working in this area is that everyone’s views are a valid as everyone elses. You don’t have to be an expert to make a valuable contribution to the debate.

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